I was watching one of the "how do they do it" programs on Discovery. They showed a guy making swords. After forging, he sends them to this company: http://www.metalscience.com/services.php for heat treatment.

They apparently cool it to -300F, then reheat it to a few hundred degrees, several times over. They claim huge increases in wear resistance, and also much greater toughness.

Anyone heard of this before, and is it really as good as they say?

Ian

Hal

03-14-2010, 12:25 PM

They CRYO treat rifle barrels, metal working tools, eye contacts, small engine for racing go cart, the engines last longer and metal music instruments, the music sounds richer.
One of the major rifle barrel maker does their blanks in house and they say the blanks machine easier and the have less rejected blanks.

Hal

AiR_GuNNeR

03-14-2010, 01:01 PM

I use cryo banjo strings, (not the most popular instrument in Michigan, but fun to play!).
They sound richer and are supposed to keep that sound longer.
Eric

lenord

03-14-2010, 02:19 PM

I thought I read somewhere that Mercedes was doing that to their racing engines ? Been doing it for a while now too.
The ones they use in Indy cars.
I googled it and found there are disk brake rotors you can buy that are cryo treated.

Lenord

Walter

03-14-2010, 02:41 PM

Cryo's a regular part of our treatment for swedges. (http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net/showthread.php?t=37886)

datsun280zxt

03-16-2010, 08:41 PM

We've done it on several engines and transmissions and other various components for personal as well as customers cars. It can significantly decrease wear and is supposed to help in overall strength. I've done it to drill bits and cutters and they last longer before needing re-sharpening. I've heard of guys having the Razors for shaving done as they are fairly expensive for the quatro blades. Different metals react differently during cryo treating. So it's worth some reading and asking the company that you're dealing with for more information.

Kart29

03-16-2010, 10:36 PM

I heard about this a long time ago from the guys at Sinden Race Services here in town. They do alot of race car parts and brake rotors on fire engines.

I think "Cold Steel" brand knives are cryo treated.

I used to believe in it. Now, I'm doubtful that it makes any difference at all. I suspect it's alot of snake oil.

datsun280zxt

03-16-2010, 11:27 PM

I heard about this a long time ago from the guys at Sinden Race Services here in town. They do alot of race car parts and brake rotors on fire engines.

I think "Cold Steel" brand knives are cryo treated.

I used to believe in it. Now, I'm doubtful that it makes any difference at all. I suspect it's alot of snake oil.

3-4 years back, we were discussing some head porting with a fellow racer. He had a custom valvetrain for his car that literally had to be replaced every other visit to the track due to the aggressive ramp rates of the rockers and cam design. Work great, ran 180mph in a front wheel drive dodge with a 4 cylinder. It was fairly costly to maintain since parts were always getting replaced. We talked about cryo-treating the valve train parts and head. He figured, what the hell can I loose. He ran it for 2 complete race seasons last I talked to him, and absolutely no signs of wear. Some of the items were titanium, not all were steel, but everything was cryotreated. I'm a believer...I sure doubted the results when I first heard about it though.

ADGO_Racing

03-17-2010, 12:08 AM

Cryo Treating is NOT "Snake Oil". We use it on V8 Blocks, heads, cranks and cams. We also do it to cast iron brake rotors and valve springs. The one place it really demonstrates the fact it is real, is on the brake rotor. it doesn't really reduce wear, but they do not warp! Race rotors will normally warp long before they will wear out. With Cryo treating, if they don't break in a wreck or under the extreme stress put on them they just may live long enough to wear out.

Valve springs are another place to really see the benefits. They retain their characteristics far longer, and are less prone to fatigue and breakage.

On blocks the bores stay round at operating temperatures. Heads stay flat at temperature reducing the wear and tear on the head gasket, also helps keep the valve stem bores straight, less stem wear and fewer broken valves due to them hanging up. Crank and cam shaft journal bores remain straight and rob less horse power from the shaft binding. Crankshafts and cam shafts stay straighter and bind/wear less.

High speed steel cutting tools do benefit too. Cutting edges last longer. But for the average home shop machinist it would be a waste of money. The benefits are found in mass production environments, not making one or ten pieces.

airsmith282

03-17-2010, 12:14 AM

i have never heard of this sort of process. but i do know my ninja sword i own is toledo powered steel and so far any sword its come against so far has been shreded by it. and its never recieved more then a nick in the blade and a small one at that .. so it could be when it was built it had that process done to the blade.

i can see in some steels that this process would be a benifit, i watch a how its made video on sword making on cnc machines, they do it this way on replicias cause the copies all have to be accurat and a repated proccesss hand forging is just not as accurate and is more time consumming, they still hardend the steels and such and the swords produced are said to be battle ready..i had a replica wallace sword long time ago and it was really sweet and very much a good battle ready sword.

my wife has a robin hood sword and you can tell its not something you want to get into a fight with its just not built for it...its defentally a decoration

That's where I first heard about it, from either the Engineer or the Apparatus Innovation forums, on Firehouse.com

I suspect it's alot of snake oil.

I picked up a set of cryo treated front rotors for my diesel Suburban from a company called 300 Below, and they lasted more than twice as long as the non treated ones. AND they were cheaper, even with shipping, than the local parts place.

Andy

dneufell

03-17-2010, 12:34 AM

I just went to Mondellos site....there use to be write-ups about all the cryo-freezing stuff he does..........................

gwilson

03-17-2010, 12:38 AM

Nothing new about this process. Even in the 19th.C.,Swiss watch makers used to leave watch parts for some time in caves in the Alps. A primitive method of cold treating them. Somehow,they had found out about the parts lasting longer when so treated.

ADGO_Racing

03-17-2010, 12:47 AM

From an engineering or metallurgical standpoint "room temperature" is not the end of the heat treating process. As a matter of fact, Cryo is still part of the heat treating process, because at room temperature there is still heat present. There is quite a bit that goes on below "room temperature". The grain structure is further refined thus strengthening the steel (Iron), not hardening it any further. It completes the process of converting Austenite to a harder more durable Martensite. It also produces Eta Carbides, which precipitate on or near the surface these also help improve wear resistance.

There are other processes which occur during the Cryo process. Although the process has been around for a while, it is still rather new, and a great deal of study is going into it. New information is constantly being discovered concerning the changes that take place during the Cryo process.

I will say this in defense of the "Snake Oil" statement(s). There are two different types of Cryo treating. One process only takes parts to about -140 F after heat treating. This is NOT true Cryo treating. People who have experience with this process will find it isn't worth the money. It is intended for certain steels after heat treating, it only finishes the heat treating process better.

Real Cryo Treating takes the parts to -320 F slowly, and holds them at that temperature for a period of time, based on the heaviest material section (Much like heat treating is held at the high temperature for a period of time based on the heaviest section). It is then returned to room temperature slowly, and continues up to a "tempering temperature" of about +350 F, again held for a period of time, based on the heaviest section. Then allowed to cool to room temperature. Temperature drop and rise are very closely controlled at a rate in the neighborhood of +/- 1.0 F/min. The process for even small thin section parts is very long. Our blocks take about three days round trip (room temp to room temp).

Doc Nickel

03-17-2010, 02:48 AM

In addition to what AGDO notes: Think of it as lengthening the range between heat and quench. We all know if you heat a cold chisel red hot and dunk it in water, the metal gets very hard- but also very brittle. We then re-heat the chisel, but to a lower temperature than before. This "tempers" the heat-treat, reducing the ultimate hardness, but also making it far less brittle and therefore considerably tougher.

Now, think of it as quenching the chisel not to just down to room temperature, but down to -300F. Then instead of tempering from room temperature to 300-400F, from -300 up to room temperature (and, as above, beyond.)

However, the "snake oil" part comes in when they start selling us "cryo" treatments for things that really aren't affected by heat-treating (cryo or otherwise.) Like the so-called better sound out of brass instruments. Sure, brass needs to be periodically annealed as it's worked to make the instrument, but will heat-treating and "tempering" actually change the sound?

I suspect like the fabled, yet unquantifiable "better sound" of a Stradivarius, much of the difference is in the mind of the listener.

Yes, cast iron rotors should wear better, and steel rifle barrels should be perhaps a bit stiffer, or possibly more wear resistant. The stiffness can help accuracy, but it can also hurt it as well. Cast heads and cranks stay straighter? Sure, just as if they'd been conventionally heat-treated.

But banjo strings sounding better? That sounds to me like a way to make the banjo player pay more for some strings.

Again, the snake oil comes from the marketing. "We can make your barrel marginally more wear-resistant" just doesn't work as a marketing buzzphrase quite as well as "Increases Range And Accuracy 1,000%!!!!1"- and, like the banjo strings "sounding" better, anyone who has their barrel done will insist the gun is now fabulously more accurate, despite their never doing control testing, or simply by the fact that Joe-Bob hit that Schlitz can with the very first shot, no problem.

Bottom line, yes, it works- in some, but not all, cases. But there's a lot of sellers and even more buyers that will attribute a great deal of snake-oil impossibilities to the process. Buyer beware.

Doc.

ADGO_Racing

03-17-2010, 03:29 AM

Thanks Doc...that was basically where I was headed with the above. As you said, Cast iron heads and blocks will see the benefit, however aluminum doesn't, but the cast liners and billet main caps do. But if you have no measurable improvement in the overall aluminum block, the cost far outweighs the benefit.

I know aluminum doesn't respond to Cryo. I do not know about copper based products, (Copper, Brass, Bronze, etc). I know from an electrical standpoint there is some benefit, however I am not an electrical engineer (I just play one around the shop:eek: ). Maybe one of the electrically savvy guys can add some insight to that part of the discussion.

As you said "Buyer beware". When sourcing such a service, one should be aware of the actual process being used. As I mentioned above, there is a process that only goes about half way to true Cryo. I know that one could be highly disappointed in the outcome if that process is used.

Also as I mentioned, it really isn't something for the Home Shop guy....It is expensive, and will never really show the true results for the guy running one, two or twenty parts. Now if you were machining a few hundred parts from inconel in a production environment, I think you would have a good benchmark, to judge your results.

MuellerNick

03-17-2010, 04:38 AM

Now, think of it as quenching the chisel not to just down to room temperature, but down to -300F. Then instead of tempering from room temperature to 300-400F, from -300 up to room temperature (and, as above, beyond.)

Well, but it ain't that way. Quenching freezes the state of the material. The only deciding factor is the cooling down rate in °C/s. Higher quality steels generally need a lower quench rate. They even are quenched in hot salts (around 200°C) to reduce the rate and thus reduce the stress.
You know the thicker the material, the higher the required rate is. Thin material can be quenched in oil, thick one needs water (talking about the same alloy). The only reason is that the core wouldn't cool down fast enough to get hard.

Razor blades are sometimes labeled as "ice hardened". It only means it is a cheaper steel. But buzz sells!

Nick

oldtiffie

03-17-2010, 07:06 AM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrogenics

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superconductivity

And just to ensure that many of the omnipotent (note the "potent") all-knowing here will have their place kept alive potentially (not sorry) for eternity and be virtually ever-living - unless some-one sterilises - or drains or destroys the(eir?) gene-pool.

Storage
The sperm is stored in small vials or straws of holding between 0.4 and 1.0 ml and cryogenically preserved in liquid nitrogen tanks. It has been proposed that there should be an upper limit on how long frozen sperm can be stored, however a baby has been conceived in the UK using sperm frozen for 21 years[1]. Before freezing, sperm may be prepared so that it can be used for intra-cervical insemination (ICI), intrauterine insemination (IUI) or for IVF(or assisted reproduction) (ART).

from:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sperm_bank#Storage

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sperm_bank

I just hope your "swimmers" (tad-poles?) don't turn into frogs - or toads.

Evan

03-17-2010, 09:52 AM

Cryo treatment is an area that is 99 percent BS with a grain of truth buried in there somewhere. There are very few materials that will benefit from cryo treatment. The endpoint of the heat treatment process is reached when the material undergoes the ductile/brittle transition. For steels and cast irons that is in the range of around freezing to -70F. Aluminum alloys never do even at absolute zero.

More importantly there is an overwhelming lack of actual evidence to substantiate the claims of improved properties supposedly gained by the process. I don't care a whit for anecdotal claims that something runs twice as long or wears half as much if you can't show me a measurable change in physical properties using the standard tests by which the properties of materials are established. Unless you care to invoke FM as the source of the change then there isn't one if it can't be measured.

ADGO_Racing

03-17-2010, 01:06 PM

That is the point of Doc and My post....There are measurable and quantifiable changes that take place. The process has to be done properly (Just like heat treating). In heat ttreating, if you just heat something up randomly, and do not quench it properly, you have a "Snake Oil" claim of heat treating. Heat treating of different alloys takes place between very specific temperatures, and cooling rates. The same is true for the Cryo Treating process.

I can build you two engines the same way. Difference being Cryo treating. Put them on the dynamometer and even you could pick out which engine was Cryoed.

For anyone willing to do the research there is a mountain of legitimate research data out there, from reputable sources, not just some bubbas claim that "it is awesome".

lazlo

03-17-2010, 01:12 PM

Cryo treatment is an area that is 99 percent BS with a grain of truth buried in there somewhere.

A lot of metallurgy texts equate cryogenic stress relief with snake oil. It does reduce retained austenite content if it's done immediately after quench, but it's unclear if that has any effect on the wear resistance of the metal.

The best objective analysis I've seen on this is the Crucible Steel Company's 2000 ASM Paper entitled "Cryogenic Treatment: A Mystery or Misery of Heat Treatment (http://books.google.com/books?id=cYzNYwMtQHcC&pg=PA237&lpg=PA237&dq=November+1999+Heat+Treat+Society+Conference+cry ogenic&source=web&ots=6z0U7lV7s4&sig=NwOmV35akHBiwhE0o3d6g2u9Im0&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#v=onepage&q=&f=false)"

Crucible (the guys who make CPM tool steel) tested a variety of tool steels in different combination of heat treatment and cryogenic freezing, and found absolutely no improvement in hardness, bend fracture strength, toughness, or wear resistance of A2, D2, M2, or CPM Rex 76.

I bought Bryson's Heat Treatment, Selection, and Application of Tool Steels (http://www.amazon.com/Heat-Treatment-Selection-Application-Steels/dp/156990376X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1268842115&sr=8-1) based on the rave recommendation on PracticalMachinist, and he has a whole chapter espousing the virtues of cryogenic heat treatment, and he describes the process to do it in a home shop. But then he goes so far as to claim that you should cryogenically process all your drills, endmills and such, claiming that it will greatly improve their wear resistance. Yet, there are no comparative studies, or even empirical evidence claimed.

Jack Nicklaus had a line of golf clubs that had cryogenically treated heats, and claimed they drove 10 - 20% further. But they dropped the line, and don't sell cryogenic clubs anymore :p

Evan

03-17-2010, 01:45 PM

For anyone willing to do the research there is a mountain of legitimate research data out there, from reputable sources, not just some bubbas claim that "it is awesome".

How about a few links to objective test results? I can't find any. To achieve many of the claimed results including "even you could pick out which engine was Cryoed" it would take more than a small change in surface hardness. There isn't even evidence for that and changes in other properties such as modulus of elasticity or resistance to stress corrosion cracking are both not explicable by any theory or able to account for better immediate performance because of such a change in properties.

What is likely is that an engine on which cryo treatment has been performed has also received other important modifications and improvement techniques such as shot peening cranks and rods, accurate balancing, high quality porting and polishing and other similar processes.

It's always a good idea to make a distinction between what you know and what you believe.

small.planes

03-17-2010, 03:32 PM

Seems there is actually a lot of comparative data for the benefits:

http://tinyurl.com/ybw3phz

<Popcorn>

Dave

Evan

03-17-2010, 05:24 PM

Seems there is actually a lot of comparative data for the benefits:

Or the lack of same. Most of the studies are behind a cash register but the few I found that aren't give the results that have been found in the past. The greatest benefits are found with tool steels but even then it only applies to materials that are being processed immediately after heat treatment. Even then there can be detrimental effects such as reductions in tensile strength cause by enhancement of microcracks at crystal boundaries. That isn't surprising considering the additional dimensional change that occurs with that much reduction in temperature.

You also need to keep in mind that this is a big business regardless of the actual benefits or lack of same. There will be plenty of studies that report all sorts of positive results. It can be difficult to spot the flaws in the methodology, especially if you don't have access to the full protocol and dataset.

It has a lot of similarities to the Cold Fusion debacle of years past.

small.planes

03-17-2010, 07:13 PM

Even most articles that are pay for give the abstract for free.
Of course the abstract couldnt give the actual numbers, thats what the article is for...
however :
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/1809057673-88215128/content~content=a791988950&db=all
states increased wear resistance,
and the first page of this one:
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/1809057673-88215128/content~content=a791988950&db=all
investigates both steel and Al cu alloy.
Heres one which suggests Cryo is a bad idea for 815M17 steel used in gears.

Yes its big business, but big businesses dont spend money without a payback
that is quantifiable.
The academics who write the papers may be biased, but peer review is meant to help eliminate that...

Dave

Evan

03-17-2010, 07:44 PM

Yes its big business, but big businesses dont spend money without a payback that is quantifiable.

They most certainly do, all the time. Warrantee service is a prime example as is R & D. Big businesses are managed by individuals who are just as susceptible to being baffled by bull as anybody else. They are also influenced greatly by customer perception who may demand that the product be treated or not buy it if it isn't cryo treated unobtanium aircraft grade billet diamond turned by CNC.

Greg Q

03-17-2010, 08:08 PM

"aircraft grade billet diamond" :) A new material standard is born.

ADGO_Racing

03-18-2010, 02:59 AM

Evan, you are correct that we make many modifications to a performance engine, that is what makes the power, but I stated "Identically prepared engines". One Cryoed and one not Cryoed....It isn't a huge difference, but enough to be sure that it isn't slight mechanical differences.

Also I have four brake rotors on my Asphalt Modified, two of them have not been replaced for two seasons, they have been turned a few times to freshen them for new brake pads, but NOT because they warped. I can also show you about a dozen other cases. As for untreated rotors, depending on the track and race distances, they will usually start to warp after a few races. They certainly do not make a full season.

I have turned away guys with aluminum heads, as it is not worth doing. However, I have had a few guys insist on spending the money to have it done. I can tell you the only gain from that type of stupidity, is me and my Cryo Vendor.

There are two ways I can instantly quantify the process. one is on the dyno. The second is by boring and honing a block, put the heads on and pump 195 F water through it until it reaches a stable operating temperature. Measure bores for roundness. They will vary considerably at operating temp, considerably being .004-.006" (Thousandths). Take the same block, rough bore, Cryo and final hone. Run the same test at 195 F, bores vary about .0003 - .0005" (Ten Thousandths). I have done this several times to demonstrate/test the process. If it happened once it would be a fluke, but consistently six times, I doubt it. The bore remaining round doesn't wear the rings and/or cylinder walls as bad, thus less blow by and an engine that produces more power longer between rebuilds.

Believe what you want. It isn't my job to persuade anyone one way or the other. I am not an automotive mechanic...I am an educated Mechanical Engineer, with 22 years of experience, I don't blindly follow the leader. I see hundreds of Voodoo products each year, the most common being crap that you can supposedly dump into the gas tank or crankcase and solve all sorts of problems magically. I didn't buy into Cryo Treating blindly. I did some research, and actual testing, and can see the actual benefits. As someone else stated, industry doesn't spend hundreds or thousands of dollars each year to chase ghosts around. They have a mountain of quantifiable data showing that it is a benefit to their process. Companies who blindly follow junk science don't last very long these days.

Evan

03-18-2010, 03:09 AM

Why then are there no ASTM standards for the cryogenic treatment of metals and their alloys? If the benefits were so dramatic and consistently realized then cryo treatment wouldn't be optional for many available standard materials since the working properties would depend on it. Yet there are no ASTM specified materials that include cryotreatment as a part of the standard.

Further checking also shows that NASA doesn't have it listed as a category of interest to them.

http://ixian.ca/pics7/cryonasa.gif

Doc Nickel

03-18-2010, 03:44 AM

Why then are there no ASTM standards for the cryogenic treatment of metals and their alloys?

-It's kind of like "alternative" medicine, like acupuncture or homeopathy. If it worked, it wouldn't be an "alternative", it'd be a mainstream treatment. :D

Now, as to what ADGO is saying, bore roundness is actually a pretty big deal- relatively speaking.

The first trick was to use a torque plate, to simulate the stresses of the head being bolted to the block. That stress tends to "lobe" the bore slightly, so the rings don't seal as well at one or more points. Using the torque plate, the block is preloaded before machining, so the finished bore ends up more "round" when the head is bolted back on.

It's not a huge issue with your typical street-driven car or truck, but can equal several measurable HP in a race engine.

The next trick was to use the torque plates, then run hot water through the block to simulate both the stress of the head and the movement due to heat. This produces an even rounder bore and better seal, and can add 2% or more HP to the peak of a top-end race engine.

The latest trick is to bolt the head onto a bare block, using the race-spec gaskets, head studs, etc., then run the hot water through, then measure the bore with something like a specialized CMM.

Then, you build a torque plate to accurately reproduce those stresses- so the bore with the plate is identically loaded to the bore with the actual race head. They now have CNC engine boring machines that can intentionally bore a distorted bore, so that when the heat and torque are reapplied, the bore is "pulled" round again. (We're talking only a few thou at best- if not less than a thou.)

This can get the bore damn near perfect under actual race conditions, and what you get is a longer-lived engine thanks to less blow-by and fuel/combustion by-product contamination of the oil; a stronger engine, again thanks to less blow-by (keeps the pressure in the chamber where it belongs) and less wear since there's less point loading on the rings.

And, since cast iron, as I understand it, is one of the more "mobile" materials when it comes to heat treating (something to do with the formation of carbon to graphite or vice-versa, and/or the graphite going from flakes to nodules, etc.) cryo treating does tend to help stabilize the castings. Especially since a great many top-end race engines are built off of brand-new blocks that haven't had the hundreds or thousands of hot/cold cycles a used street engine has seen.

So no, it's not like you can take a box-stock Chevy 350, dunk it in liquid nitrogen and pull out a Rodek 462. But it is- when properly used- a valid step when making a carefully-assembled and tuned top-end race engine.

That's what keeps the "snake oil" bit going- it does work on some things, but unscrupulous types will parlay that success to anything else they can con somebody to cough up a fee for. Like brass instruments, banjo strings, aluminum heads and, for all I know, hamburger patties and iPhone apps.

Doc.

Evan

03-18-2010, 04:25 AM

Cast iron isn't something you casually heat treat. Heat treatment of cast iron induces gross changes in properties. For instance, to make ductile iron you first make white chilled iron by casting the melt on a chill plate or similar. The requirement that you start with white iron limits the available section sizes of ductile iron. Once you have white iron you heat treat it and let it cool slowly. This produces ductile iron. Since nearly all cast irons have ductile/brittle transition temperatures in the zero F range further cooling is unlikely to make a significant difference during heat treatment compared to the already dramatic changes that heat treating cast iron produces. There is so much natural variation that minor changes will be below the noise level. Also, there is no going back. You can't turn ductile cast iron into white cast iron without recasting.

These are the transition temperatures for a wide range of cast irons.

http://metalshopborealis.ca/pics/ironductbrit.gif

As I have said, there is a grain of truth in there but it isn't enough to justify an industry. It serves to prove one important fact. You can fool a lot of corporations a lot of the time, but I already knew that. Otherwise Xerox wouldn't have switched tracks every few years internally just like many large companies do.

-In the case of cast iron engines, my point- and I believe ADGO's as well- is less the changes in material properties (harder, softer, more brittle, less brittle, what have you) and more the additional stress relief.

As before, the "improvement" for an engine is less some change or trait of the metal itself (with the possible exceptions of highly-stressed alloy steels, like the valvesprings, which apparently see an improved fatigue life) and more along the lines of the process being an additional method used to help stabilize/stress-relieve the casting.

And anecdotal confirmation of that is the generally-accepted idea (at least through engine builders) that the cryo does little to help used blocks and heads, since they've already been through multiple heat cycles.

As ADGO notes, I've heard of people insisting on doing the treatment anyway, but then, people still fall for the Nigerian scams and buy unlabelled Viagra through the mail, too. :D

Doc.

MuellerNick

03-18-2010, 08:48 AM

and more along the lines of the process being an additional method used to help stabilize/stress-relieve the casting.

There are two ways to relieve stress. One is the accepted method:
Heat the material until its strength gets below the internal stress. Now the material can flow and the stress be relieved. That maximum remaining stress typically is about 10% of the strength of the material.

Now looking at things the other way, you could increase internal stress by some means and thus get the material to flow and the stress then would/should be reduced when back in normal state.
If you do that by cooling below the brittle state, you'll end up with a lot of microscopic cracks.

Not what one wants, I guess.

Nick

lazlo

03-18-2010, 12:42 PM

Why then are there no ASTM standards for the cryogenic treatment of metals and their alloys? If the benefits were so dramatic and consistently realized then cryo treatment wouldn't be optional for many available standard materials since the working properties would depend on it. Yet there are no ASTM specified materials that include cryotreatment as a part of the standard.

Not only that, have you ever see any cutting tool or drill with cryogenic treatment? Wouldn't Carpenter/CPM, Kennametal, Sandvik et al offer cryogenically-treated cutting tools if it increased the wear resistance?

Further checking also shows that NASA doesn't have it listed as a category of interest to them.

When Small Planes posted his Google link, I scanned through a couple of papers, and one of the first I found was a NASA study that indicated they saw no material change in tensile strength or wear resistance on cryogenic treatment of aluminum weldments (the topic of the paper).

Small Planes commented that the papers were academics, but the first paper I posted was from Carpenter Tool Steel, where they saw absolutely no improvement in cryogenically treated tool steel. This is one of the oldest tool steel companies, and they would definitely have a financial interest in exploiting crygenically treated tool steel, if it worked...

lazlo

03-18-2010, 12:46 PM

Evan, you are correct that we make many modifications to a performance engine, that is what makes the power, but I stated "Identically prepared engines". One Cryoed and one not Cryoed....

All the places I've seen offering cryogenic heat treatment suggest improvements in wear resistance, due to the conversion of residual Austentite. How would that make a difference on a dyno?

warbird

03-18-2010, 01:53 PM

You have a good discussion going here, and I'd like to add some comments. First a disclaimer. I own a cryo processing facility. I am a metallurgist. I am also co-chair of the ASM committee on cryogenic processing. (www.asm-intl.org)

However, the "snake oil" part comes in when they start selling us "cryo" treatments for things that really aren't affected by heat-treating (cryo or otherwise.) Like the so-called better sound out of brass instruments. Sure, brass needs to be periodically annealed as it's worked to make the instrument, but will heat-treating and "tempering" actually change the sound?

Actually, basic metallurgy will tell you that cryo affects brass (and aluminum and titanium, etc.) The process is working at the crystal structure level and has an affect on the crystal lattice and its point defects. That being said, it is easy to see that it will affect the vibrational characteristics of metals. Experiments show that the process affects the resonant frequencies of metals.

I know aluminum doesn't respond to Cryo. I do not know about copper based products, (Copper, Brass, Bronze, etc).
There are papers written by responsible entities on the use of cryo on non-ferrous metals. Linde (a large industrial gas company) wrote one on the use of cryo on copper. NASA published one on aluminum. These are available on
the web with a lot of other papers on the Cryogenic Society of America's data base at http://www.cryogenictreatmentdatabase.org/.

Cryo treatment is an area that is 99 percent BS with a grain of truth buried in there somewhere. There are very few materials that will benefit from cryo treatment. The endpoint of the heat treatment process is reached when the material undergoes the ductile/brittle transition. For steels and cast irons that is in the range of around freezing to -70F. Aluminum alloys never do even at absolute zero.

More importantly there is an overwhelming lack of actual evidence to substantiate the claims of improved properties supposedly gained by the process. I don't care a whit for anecdotal claims that something runs twice as long or wears half as much if you can't show me a measurable change in physical properties using the standard tests by which the properties of materials are established.

Almost all metals respond to cryo. It is not simply a part of heat treat, as many metals that are not heat treated respond. By the way, the end of the austenite to martensite transformation is more like about -140F than -70F. About the "overwhelming lack of actual evidence" go to the above mentioned data base site are read the scientific papers there. (Be aware that there are some papers there that are not scientific also.)

As for tests, my company has participated in tests with Illinois Institute of Technology, the US Army, Los Alamos National Lab, Marquette University and others. We have had tests done on brake rotors by independent laboratories that consistently show increases of wear resistance of 200% to 400%. The US Postal Service had tests on brake rotors done to determine which rotors to use. The cryo treated rotors showed over five times the life of the name brand rotor second place rotor.

By the way, cryo is not an extension of the heat treat brake of rotors. Brake rotors are are not heat treated. They are pearlitic in structure and have no retained austenite to convert to martensite.

A lot of metallurgy texts equate cryogenic stress relief with snake oil. It does reduce retained austenite content if it's done immediately after quench, but it's unclear if that has any effect on the wear resistance of the metal.

Please name some of these texts. If you read the research by Dr. Barron and others you will see that this statement is not correct.

Now looking at things the other way, you could increase internal stress by some means and thus get the material to flow and the stress then would/should be reduced when back in normal state.
If you do that by cooling below the brittle state, you'll end up with a lot of microscopic cracks.

Yes you can increase the stress if you do not do the process right. If you do it right, you do not have this problem. That is why we get over four times the life on valve springs, an item you would not want cracks in. By the way, we treat valve springs for some manufacturers.

There is a lot happening in metals as you drop the temperature. Vacancies start to move, alloying elements migrate, carbides form. One theory of the process (unproven as yet) is that there is an ideal distance between atoms that represents the lowest energy state in the crystal lattice structure. The theory states that by removing heat energy from the material, you cause more of the atoms to go to that energy level and that gives a more perfect crystal.

The nay-sayers need a bit more information. That is why ASM and the Cryogenic Society of America are working to separate the wheat from the chaff. Yes there are a lot of companies that make a lot of irresponsible claims. I've seen statements like "nobody has blown a cryo treated engine", and "increases the tensile strength of steel ten times" and "densifies metal", and statements about the "molecular structure" of metals. We need to bring this process into scientific focus. But to call it snake oil is irresponsible at this time.

MuellerNick

03-18-2010, 02:32 PM

The theory states that by removing heat energy from the material, you cause more of the atoms to go to that energy level and that gives a more perfect crystal.

Thanks for that theory. Makes much more sense than the other explanations I've read here.

Nick

rowbare

03-18-2010, 02:58 PM

There were a few threads on CNCZone about this in the past:

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=53524

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=75983

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=34284

bob

lazlo

03-18-2010, 03:02 PM

A lot of metallurgy texts equate cryogenic stress relief with snake oil. It does reduce retained austenite content if it's done immediately after quench, but it's unclear if that has any effect on the wear resistance of the metal.

Please name some of these texts. If you read the research by Dr. Barron and others you will see that this statement is not correct.

I posted this paper by the Crucible Steel Company that was published/peer reviewed by the ASM (American Society of Metals -- the society to which you belong), and included in the ASM Heat Treat Society 2000 proceedings:

The best objective analysis I've seen on this is the Crucible Steel Company's 2000 ASM Paper entitled "Cryogenic Treatment: A Mystery or Misery of Heat Treatment (http://books.google.com/books?id=cYzNYwMtQHcC&pg=PA237&lpg=PA237&dq=November+1999+Heat+Treat+Society+Conference+cry ogenic&source=web&ots=6z0U7lV7s4&sig=NwOmV35akHBiwhE0o3d6g2u9Im0&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#v=onepage&q=&f=false)"

Crucible (the guys who make CPM tool steel) tested a variety of tool steels in different combination of heat treatment and cryogenic freezing, and found absolutely no improvement in hardness, bend fracture strength, toughness, or wear resistance of A2, D2, M2, or CPM Rex 76.

Crucible's conclusion is the following:

"Laboratory and commercial cryogenic treatments applied after an oil quench with a single temper, or in between a first and second temper, had no significant or consistent effects on the properties of A2 and D2 samples that were hardened from standard austentizing temperatures and tempered at either 425K (300°F) or 810K (1000°F).

Laboratory and commercial cryogenic treatments applied after the first, or final tempering operations has no significant effects on the properties of CPM M4 and CPM Rex 76 high speed steel samples that were oil quenched from standard austentizing temperatures and triple tempered at 825K (1025° F)."

I'm certainly willing to be convinced, but I've not seen a quantitative study that showed any measurable or repeatable benefits of cryogenic heat treatments, and I'm puzzled why cutting tools are not cryogenically treated if it greatly improves their wear resistance.

lazlo

03-18-2010, 03:27 PM

There are papers written by responsible entities on the use of cryo on non-ferrous metals. Linde (a large industrial gas company) wrote one on the use of cryo on copper. NASA published one on aluminum.

I mentioned the NASA paper on the cryogenic treatment of aluminum a couple of posts up. They found almost no measurable improvement:

Effect of Cyogenic Treatment on the Residual Stress and Mechanical Propoerty of an Aerospace Aluminum Alloy, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Marsh Space Flight Center

Minor increases in tensile strength and hardness were noted for parent metal.

No significant changes were found in tensile properties for weld specimens or in fatigue properties for parent metal.

Evan

03-18-2010, 04:25 PM

Actually, basic metallurgy will tell you that cryo affects brass (and aluminum and titanium, etc.) The process is working at the crystal structure level and has an affect on the crystal lattice and its point defects. That being said, it is easy to see that it will affect the vibrational characteristics of metals. Experiments show that the process affects the resonant frequencies of metals.

Basic physics tells me that reducing the temperature reduces the available energy for anything at all to happen. The "process" cannot alter the mass or the room temperature density of a material which are the determining factors of resonance aside from Young's Modulus.

Almost all metals respond to cryo. It is not simply a part of heat treat, as many metals that are not heat treated respond. By the way, the end of the austenite to martensite transformation is more like about -140F than -70F.

The transformation to martensite is far more dependent on cooling rate than it is on temperature. Endpoint Temperature is almost incidental as long as it is below the phase change knee by a significant amount. Bearing steels are the primary class of alloys where austenite conversion is completed via active below zero cooling and the endpoint for complete elimination of austenite is -70 F. The reason for this special treatment is for dimensional stability since at room temperature austenite is metastable and will convert to martensite when stressed. The process only works if applied immediately upon cooling of the ingot and before tempering.

The cryo treated rotors showed over five times the life of the name brand rotor second place rotor.

That is a meaningless statement. How long did the exact same rotor last if untreated compared to treated?

There is a lot happening in metals as you drop the temperature. Vacancies start to move, alloying elements migrate, carbides form. One theory of the process (unproven as yet) is that there is an ideal distance between atoms that represents the lowest energy state in the crystal lattice structure. The theory states that by removing heat energy from the material, you cause more of the atoms to go to that energy level and that gives a more perfect crystal.

That isn't a theory. A theory is a hypothesis that has been promoted to the status of theory by supporting experimental evidence that is consistent with the known laws of physics. In particular your last sentence is nonsense. The only way for atoms to assume the *SAME* energy level is by the formation of a Bose-Einstein Condensate, something that can only happen under very special circumstances at a temperature a tiny fraction of a degree above absolute zero.

A crystal is composed of atoms that are arranged in a particular three dimensional pattern. That pattern in the case of iron may be Face Centered Cubic or Body Centered Cubic. Cooling a FCC or BCC crystal to any given temperature doesn't make it more or less perfect, it merely temporarily alters the vibrational energy (kinetic energy) of the individual atoms. Warm it back up and it is still the same crystal with the same kinetic energy it had before you cooled it. In the case of iron the BCC phase is the ferritic phase and the FCC phase is the Austenitic phase. Plain iron undergoes about a 9% decrease in density as it cools from FCC to BCC at 1664 degrees F. To invoke extreme cooling as a reason for a change from FCC to BCC structure actually is the opposite of what should happen were anything to happen at all.

The formation of iron carbides takes place outside the iron crystal structures and occurs at temperatures well above room temperature. Decreasing temperature decreases the mobility and energy levels of the iron and carbon atoms and will not form additional carbides. What it will do is open interstitial gaps because of normal temperature dependent shrinking of the entire structure as kinetic energy is removed. This will result in the slight shifting of existing carbide concentrations while at the same time increasing the quantity of dislocations in the crystal structure caused the poorly fitting iron carbides.

Aluminum alloys exhibit little to no changes at temperatures all the way to absolute zero. In fact, they become slightly more ductile the colder they are.

Doc Nickel

03-18-2010, 04:44 PM

We have had tests done on brake rotors by independent laboratories that consistently show increases of wear resistance of 200% to 400%. The US Postal Service had tests on brake rotors done to determine which rotors to use. The cryo treated rotors showed over five times the life of the name brand rotor second place rotor.

-You're going to have to show me the data for that particular pill before I'm gonna swallow it.

By what mechanism- as in how is it supposed to work- does the cryo treatment harden the cast iron to be 400% more wear-resistant? That borders on converting it to an entirely different material, and no offense, but transmutation falls squarely under the 'snake-oil' claims we've been complaining about.

I also fail to see how the iron could be 400% more wear resistant, yet not suffer a significant- and deal breaking- reduction in gripping force. In other words, 400% longer life is easy- just reduce braking power by 80%. :D

By the way, cryo is not an extension of the heat treat brake of rotors. Brake rotors are are not heat treated.

-Then again, if it's not a heat treatment, just what mechanism is involved? Are you suggesting- as some have- that the immersion in liquid nitrogen does a sort of low-level "nitriding" of the surface? Or is it simply a matter of the "more perfect crystal structure" of the iron, a structure that is apparently not compromised by the repeated reheating and rapid-air-cooling while the brakes are in use.

Doc.

Evan

03-18-2010, 04:49 PM

BTW, welcome to the board. Machinists can be a tough crowd especially when we all agree on something. And, this might be the first time in memory that Lazlo, Doc and myself are all in agreement. :D

ADGO_Racing

03-18-2010, 10:11 PM

My guess is that the brake rotors do not really "wear" less, as the cryo process does not change surface or core hardness. However, the lack of them warping, I would think increase the life expectancy. There are some local state police cars fitted with cryoed brake rotors. They too claim that in a normal high speed chase the cops will destroy the rotors. But the Cryoed rotors are holding up just fine.

Mcgyver

03-19-2010, 12:00 AM

Yes Warbird, welcome to the board...we could use a metallurgist or two or three around here, lots or orny machinists to be sure, but underscore with an interest in learning so hopefully you stick around and contribute some metallurgy

I'd always thought of cyro treatment as a stress relieving process, didn't know there was a wear resisitance angle....apparently i'm not even part of the snake oil salesmen's coming and goings

Ian B

03-19-2010, 03:28 AM

Interesting reading the accounts of brake rotors warping or not. I had always assumed that the warpage was the result of heating the outer part of the rotor (the braking area) while the hub stayed relatively cool. The outer part expands and distorts, and some distortion remains when the whole lot cools off.

When the rotor becomes hot and cools again, wouldn't this "erase" any effects of previous heat (or cool) treatments?

You know what the most effective weight loss medications are? The most expensive ones.

The saying goes like this:

You can fool some of the people all of the time.

You can fool all of the people some of the time.

You can't fool all of the people all of the time.

warbird

03-19-2010, 12:44 PM

Evan

Basic physics tells me that reducing the temperature reduces the available energy for anything at all to happen. The "process" cannot alter the mass or the room temperature density of a material which are the determining factors of resonance aside from Young's Modulus.

Cryo does alter the crystal lattice structure. It reduces vacancies and other point defects. "For all temperatures above 0 K there is a thermodynamically stable concentration of vacancies and interstitial atoms. Introducing a point defect into a crystal increases its internal energy vis-a-vis a perfect crystal." (from STRUCTURE-PROPERTY RELATIONS IN NONFERROUS METALS, A. Russel & K. Lee)

The propagation of sound and vibration through a metal is affected by the crystal structure. Young's Modulus is a average, overall figure which could be calculated for a perfect crystal, but there are few perfect crystals. I am sure that you would find that Young's modulus in a grain boundary is not the same as that of the entire volume of the part, and in a similar vein, a crystal with a large number of point defects will have a different Young's Modulus than a perfect crystal. So, yes, I can alter Young's Modulus within the crystal, and that will change vibration and therefore sound.

The transformation to martensite is far more dependent on cooling rate than it is on temperature. Endpoint Temperature is almost incidental as long as it is below the phase change knee by a significant amount. Bearing steels are the primary class of alloys where austenite conversion is completed via active below zero cooling and the endpoint for complete elimination of austenite is -70 F. The reason for this special treatment is for dimensional stability since at room temperature austenite is metastable and will convert to martensite when stressed. The process only works if applied immediately upon cooling of the ingot and before tempering.

The austenite to martensite transformation is very temperature dependent. That is why there is a martensite finish temperature for an alloy. Cryo treatment of metals with retained austenite will cause the austenite to transform. It is also heat dependent. That is why multiple tempering cycles reduce the amount of retained austenite. It is also stress related.

The myth that you cannot cryo treat weeks after heat treating is silly. I do a lot of cutting tools months after they are made and find very good results.

You are right about my misstatement of the theory. I meant to talk about the energy of the metallic bond, but was in a hurry.

A crystal is composed of atoms that are arranged in a particular three dimensional pattern. That pattern in the case of iron may be Face Centered Cubic or Body Centered Cubic. Cooling a FCC or BCC crystal to any given temperature doesn't make it more or less perfect, it merely temporarily alters the vibrational energy (kinetic energy) of the individual atoms. Warm it back up and it is still the same crystal with the same kinetic energy it had before you cooled it. In the case of iron the BCC phase is the ferritic phase and the FCC phase is the Austenitic phase. Plain iron undergoes about a 9% decrease in density as it cools from FCC to BCC at 1664 degrees F. To invoke extreme cooling as a reason for a change from FCC to BCC structure actually is the opposite of what should happen were anything to happen at all.

Nonsense. Basic metallurgy states this. See the citation above from STRUCTURE-PROPERTY RELATIONS IN NONFERROUS METALS. The warm up will not induce all the point defects to return because the production process of the metal causes more defects than the equilibrium level to occur. I do not understand why you have a discussion about going from an austenitic phase to a ferritic phase. Cryo will cause austenite to become martensite, not ferrite. This does happen and is supported by research. This is why cold treatment is done down to -140 F. At that point, pretty much all of the austenite that is going to change has changed.

The formation of iron carbides takes place outside the iron crystal structures and occurs at temperatures well above room temperature. Decreasing temperature decreases the mobility and energy levels of the iron and carbon atoms and will not form additional carbides. What it will do is open interstitial gaps because of normal temperature dependent shrinking of the entire structure as kinetic energy is removed. This will result in the slight shifting of existing carbide concentrations while at the same time increasing the quantity of dislocations in the crystal structure caused the poorly fitting iron carbides.

HUH? Are you saying carbides are not in the iron matrix? Are they poured in to the metal?

The effects of this deep cryogenic treatment mechanism are:
A much greater number of fine carbide particals in the microstructure.
A different partition of alloying elements between matrix and carbides, compared with conventionally treated steels.
An improvement in wear resistance of the steel.
An increase in toughness
Little or no increase in hardness.
CRYOGENIC TREATMENT OF TOOL STEELS, David N. Collins, National Heat Treatment Centre, University College, Dublin Ireland; Advanced Materials & Processes, December 1998, H23 to H29.

As to the paper you cited, go to the CSA's database and read paper after paper that shows the increase in wear resistance. The Collins paper listed above is a good one. Also go to ASM Metals Handbook desk edition and look up cryogenic processing. The overwhelming evidence is that cryo will increase wear resistance. Here is another citaition:

The deep cryogenic treatment (-196 degrees C) of quenched and tempered high speed steel tools improves their properties, in particular, it increases the hardness and improves the hardness homogeneity reduces the tool consumption and the down time for the equipment's set up, thus leading to about 50% cost reduction. ...While in the AISI M2 steel the increase can be attributed to the increased hardness, in the case of AISI H13 steel the increased wear resistance can be correlated to the increased toughness.
EFFECT OF DEEP CRYOGENIC TREATMENT ON THE MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF TOOL STEELS, A. Molinan, M. Pellizzari, S. Gialanella, G. Straffelini, K.H. Stiasny. Journal of Materials Technology 118 (2001), Pages 350-355. The above named researchers are with University of Trento, Trento Italy, and/or GKN Birfield AG. GKN is a world wide manufacturer of automotive drive line parts for OEM and replacement markets.

Notice that they show an increase in tool consumption. Cryo works on cutting tools, we do it all the time.

warbird

03-19-2010, 12:45 PM

Ian B:

Brake rotors can warp for a number of reasons. Even a treated rotor will warp if gotten red hot and then stopped in a puddle of water that unevenly cools it. A lot of warping is caused by residual stresses induced in the manufacture of the rotor. Cryo seems to reduce these stresses and to make the metal more stable. I can't tell more than that because I do not have the research facilities or time to do the research. One of the best uses of cryo is stabilize parts before machining so they do not move during machining.

To erase the affects of cold treatment you would have to get the rotor hot enough to start the formation of austenite. At that point the rotor is garbage anyway.

Mcgyver
Wear resistance is what started cryo. The early research by Dr. Randall Barron focused on the wear resistance aspect of the process. The earliest uses were for the wear resistance in Jumo aircraft engines in Germany in the late 1930's. Also, a company in Massachusetts started cryoing knives in the early 1940's. The wear resistance we see on engine parts and tooling is exceptional. I found a three times life factor when I was researching die life at FelPro.

ADGO_Racing
The wear is definitely less. We've had dozens of rotors test by Greening Labs and by Link Labs (independent brake testing labs) to SAE 2707 JUL 2004 METHOD B. The results show that treated rotors have two to four times the wear life of untreated rotors. We also tested two rotors to the point where they were beyond service limits. Both rotors went through the 2707 test cycles multiple times. The treated rotor was 0.031" thicker at the end of the test.

Doc Nickel
See above. SAE 2707 JUL 2004 METHOD B is the accepted wear test in the brake industry. The independent labs did not know which rotors were treated and which were not. They are well known labs with no interest in the results. We've tested rotors by different manufacturers. Cryo improves rotor wear.

Why? Heck if I know at this point. Rotors are grey cast iron, usually J431 G3000 or close to it. The microstructure is pearlitic with no visible retained austenite. More research is needed to determine why the process reduces wear in this situation. My guess is that it is the formation of very fine carbides, but they would have to be iron carbides. Also, we think that our theory about the crystal structure becoming more uniform and the reduction in energy in the metallic bonds due to this may have something to do with this.

As to the reduction in braking power, that would have been detected in the SAE tests above, where caliper pressures and temperatures are recorded.

Let's get things clear here. Cryo treating by immersion in liquid nitrogen is about as effective as heat treating by immersion in molten steel. The cryo treatment involves the relatively slow reduction of temperature of the part to cryogenic temperatures. (Cryogenic temperatures are defined by the Cryogenic Society of America as temperatures below -244F.) Cryo is not a surface effect. It treats the entire volume of the part.

Evan

03-19-2010, 01:49 PM

You are going to make me haul out my volume of Transport Phenomena for a few quotes.

Before I do that though please explain why there are no ASTM standards that include "cryo treatment" as part of the definition? A several 100 percent improvement in wear resistance isn't a minor change, it's an entirely different material. I am not the only one that thinks this is bunk.

Cryo does alter the crystal lattice structure. It reduces vacancies and other point defects. "For all temperatures above 0 K there is a thermodynamically stable concentration of vacancies and interstitial atoms. Introducing a point defect into a crystal increases its internal energy vis-a-vis a perfect crystal." (from STRUCTURE-PROPERTY RELATIONS IN NONFERROUS METALS, A. Russel & K. Lee)

That quote does not indicate that cooling a crystal will change the crystal structure. You are arguing using the logical fallacy of juxtaposition. You cannot increase the energy of a crystal by cooling it. Introducing a point defect in a crystal requires an input of energy.

I do not understand why you have a discussion about going from an austenitic phase to a ferritic phase. Cryo will cause austenite to become martensite, not ferrite.

I see. That explains a lot. You see, Martensite is a form of ferrite. There are only two basic crystal forms of iron, Austenite and Ferrite. Martensite belongs to the Ferritic BCC crystal form. There are two types of Ferrite, Alpha and delta, but both are BCC crystal structure. Martensite doesn't even appear on the iron phase diagram.

warbird

03-19-2010, 02:54 PM

There is no ASTM standard because ASTM has not written a standard. Is it necessary to have an ASTM standard to make something real? It is not an "entirely different material" just because you take better advantage of what is there.

If you introduce a lot of defects into a crystal structure such as inclusions, you get a weaker structure. By cooling the crystal structure you reduce the point defects making it a more perfect structure. That is a change in the crystal structure.

Nowhere did I say anything about increasing the energy of the crystal structure.

There are two forms of the definition of ferrite in Metals Handbook. The ferrite I am referring to is "An essentially carbon-free solid...." So now that we have defined what each of us is talking about it should be more clear.

If cryo is bunk, how do you explain my results on brake rotors? How do you explain the research papers that I have quoted. How do you explain the multiple research papers in the Cryogenic Society of America data base?

Doc Nickel

03-19-2010, 03:49 PM

If cryo is bunk, how do you explain my results on brake rotors?

-Because, no offense, I'm not going to take your word for it. On the other hand, if something like a relatively inexpensive process like cryotreatment could improve the useful life of something by 400%, we'd see the auto manufacturers, among others, adopting it on the factory floor.

Now, again, keep in mind I'm not saying all cryo is bunk. As I've already noted, there are some benefits to it, though largely limited to certain alloys of steels, most of which were already specially formulated to provide various benefits when heat-treated, conventionally or otherwise.

However, your quotes from texts on tool steels and nonferrous metals don't explain how a cast-iron brake rotor can suddenly become 400% more wear-resistant. Yes, you quoted an SAE test specification, but not the data of the tests themselves.

I'd still be very much interested in reading the actual test documentation.

Doc.

lazlo

03-19-2010, 04:30 PM

The myth that you cannot cryo treat weeks after heat treating is silly. I do a lot of cutting tools months after they are made and find very good results.

How are you measuring your results? When you say "you do cutting tools" -- do you have a commercial operation cryogenically treating cutting tools?

I've asked several times in the thread -- why are there no cryogenically treated cutting tools offered for sale? You'd think that Kennametal, Crucible Steel, Sandvik, et al would be selling crygenically treated cutting tools...

As to the paper you cited, go to the CSA's database and read paper after paper that shows the increase in wear resistance. The Collins paper listed above is a good one. Also go to ASM Metals Handbook desk edition and look up cryogenic processing.

You have to be a member to download those papers. Could you explain the discrepancy with Crucible Steel Companies' findings published in your ASM Metals' Proceedings that state that they see no changes in the material properties of tool steels?

If you can convince a big tool steel company like Carpenter/Crucible Steel, or Kennamental et al, there would be a lot of money to be made :)

Doc Nickel

03-19-2010, 04:42 PM

I've asked several times in the thread -- why are there no cryogenically treated cutting tools offered for sale? You'd think that Kennametal, Crucible Steel, Sandvik, et al would be selling crygenically treated cutting tools...

-Playing the devil's advocate for the moment, I'll note two things: First is that kennametal, et al, deal largely in carbide inserts and cutters. I very much suspect that the various tempering and heat-treating tricks have basically no effect on sintered carbides.

And two, for their steel cutters, it's entirely possible that they do cryo-treat, but don't necessarily advertise it, keeping it as a sort of 'trade secret'. The process is fairly straightforward, and if you had a way to make your cutters last 50% to 400% longer than the competition's, wouldn't you try to keep it under wraps? :D

I'm not saying either of those are true, just adding a bit of perspective.

Doc.

Evan

03-19-2010, 04:46 PM

There are two forms of the definition of ferrite in Metals Handbook. The ferrite I am referring to is "An essentially carbon-free solid...." So now that we have defined what each of us is talking about it should be more clear.

That isn't what you have been talking about nor is it a difference in kind. Martensite is a ferritic form of iron and you should know that.

Notice that they show an increase in tool consumption. Cryo works on cutting tools, we do it all the time.

That paper seems only available for a fee, but I did find this companion paper from the same authors. Their conclusion seems to explain why various researchers report benefits ranging from negative (i.e., a decrease in wear resistance and fracture toughness) to non-existent to miraculous. The cryogenic treatment converts residual austenite to martensite. So if the heat treatment is incomplete, there's a lot of residual austentite, and therefore more opportunity to correct the heat treatment with a cryogenic quench.

http://www.aimnet.it/allpdf/pdf_pubbli/set08/pellizzari.pdf

"DCT [Deep Cryogenic Treatment] significantly influences the wear resistance of wrought steels, because of the prominent role played by the martensitic matrix. A marked increase was shown by HS6-5-2, whilst a general worsening was displayed by HS6-5-2-5, thus highlighting the negative role of cobalt."
Note the last part. In this paper (from the authors that Warbird recommended), they had a 32% improvement in M2 wear resistance, but they found that tool steels containing cobalt (basically, most high-speed steels), showed a substantial decrease (40%) in wear resistance from cryogenic quench:

Come on over and I will show you the data and test reports. Or go to my web page where we have published some of it. I gave you a spec that tells you what the test was and I gave you the results.

I quoted you the data of the wear test when we wore the rotors past service limits. That gives you the method and the results. What the heck do you want?

The auto companies are scared of change and avoid it like the plague. They won't adopt cryo because the make a lot of money on repair parts. So cryo brakes would cost them a ton of money.

Lazlo
They don't want to lose sales. And what do you mean you have to be a member to download articles off the CSA data base? That is absurd. Are you guys making this up? CSA went to great lengths to get permission for as many copy write holders as they could to present you with downloadable articles. Yes some cannot be downloaded as CSA could not get the rights.

As far as cutting tools, we treat for companies that have found this stuff works. Their production records prove it.

You quote one paper and want to know why, I give you a data base full of research and you ignore it. If I get a chance, I will read your paper and see what they were doing. I do know that they were dipping some parts in LN2 in that paper and the cryo treatment was unspecified. That makes it a doubtful test.

Evan
Most metallurgists that I know refer to martensite as martensite to be more precise because of the double definition. I will be more careful in the future when communicating with you. I am sure that when you think of pearlite you are not thinking that it is metastable aggregate of martensite and cementite.

Lazlo
Interesting data, but there is no supporting information and no citation, so it is therefore useless.

lazlo

03-19-2010, 06:59 PM

Lazlo
Interesting data, but there is no supporting information and no citation, so it is therefore useless.

That's the same authors from the paper you cited (that's not available to the public)? It's a published paper complete with citations and experimental data:

http://www.aimnet.it/allpdf/pdf_pubbli/set08/pellizzari.pdf

As far as cutting tools, we treat for companies that have found this stuff works. Their production records prove it.

However, the same authors have hosted the paper I cited above, which shows negative impact for cryogenic treatment of tool steels as often as positive.

http://www.aimnet.it/allpdf/pdf_pubbli/set08/pellizzari.pdf

Evan

03-19-2010, 07:23 PM

I will be more careful in the future when communicating with you.

That is wise. I have zero tolerance for pseudo scientific fraud. I will point out that I do not represent or have any special relationship with the owners of this site. My opinions and statements are entirely my own responsibility.

The concept of cryo treatment is precisely as I described at the beginning of this thread. It is 99% BS with a grain of truth. The ASTM database contains no references to cryotreatement as part of their heat treatment protocols for metals. The NASA Scientific Document database contains no significant data and NASA has no investigatory interest in the concept. The European CORDIS database for the pan-European Institute of Tribology has no documents on record describing the process or any results of the process.

There is no scientific justification for the claims commonly made for the process. It falls in the same category as Cold Fusion, Clustered Water, Acetone treatment of Gasoline and Free Energy in general. With the exception of the very few accepted, tested and documented examples such as I have mentioned It is BUNK.

You have a good discussion going here, and I'd like to add some comments. First a disclaimer. I own a cryo processing facility. I am a metallurgist. I am also co-chair of the ASM committee on cryogenic processing. (www.asm-intl.org)
My first words in this forum are quoted above. Yes, I own a cryo company. I just do not think it appropriate to advertise by going to these sites.

I will read the paper you quoted when I have a chance this weekend.

The CSA data base is not my website, it belongs to the CSA. I am NOT US Cryogenics.

Evan, you are entitled to your opinions no matter how silly they are. You insult the researchers who work hard to find out what this process can do. You are calling people from IIT, the US Army, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Purdue University, University College, Dublin Ireland, NASA, Marquette University and others as frauds. You offer no real argument against their work other than you do not believe it.

lazlo

03-19-2010, 08:21 PM

You insult the researchers who work hard to find out what this process can do. You are calling people from IIT, the US Army, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Purdue University, University College, Dublin Ireland, NASA, Marquette University and others as frauds.

The NASA paper concludes "No significant changes were found in tensile properties for weld specimens or in fatigue properties for parent metal."

The ASM paper concludes ""Laboratory and commercial cryogenic treatments applied after an oil quench with a single temper, or in between a first and second temper, had no significant or consistent effects on the properties of A2 and D2 samples that were hardened from standard austentizing temperatures and tempered at either 425K (300°F) or 810K (1000°F)."

You offer no real argument against their work other than you do not believe it.

You're selling a service. You should be able to offer credible evidence that the service provides some benefit. We haven't seen that yet.

John Stevenson

03-19-2010, 08:26 PM

Wow,
This thread is getting seriously interesting, I'm hooked :D

In the Blue corner we have Warbird who by his own admission, and I quote: - "First a disclaimer. I own a cryo processing facility. I am a metallurgist. I am also co-chair of the ASM committee on cryogenic processing. (www.asm-intl.org) (http://www.asm-intl.org%29/)"

Note the 'own' 'metallurgist' and co-chair of the ASM, nothing to be sneezed at.

In the Red corner we have Evan, a retired photocopier repair man who by his own admission has had that many jobs he ought to be 184 years old give or take a couple of months.

Note the 'Don't own anything ' not a metallurgist' and not on any chairs '

Pull a chair up guys, this is going to get interesting.

.

lazlo

03-19-2010, 08:35 PM

In the Blue corner we have Warbird who by his own admission, and I quote: - "First a disclaimer. I own a cryo processing facility. I am a metallurgist. I am also co-chair of the ASM committee on cryogenic processing. (www.asm-intl.org) (http://www.asm-intl.org%29/)"

John, the guy's name is F. J. "Rick" Diekman -- and a quick Google search shows him all over the Internet, everytime the question comes up as to whether Cryogenic treatments are legitimate. He must run a periodic scan of the 'net looking for queries about cryogenic treatments.

Here he quotes the NASA paper that I posted earlier in the thread (which stated that they found negligible results):

There is no doubt that cryo treatment of rotors increases their life. Porsche has been treating the rotors on its endurance cars for years now. Besides that, we've had both Link Laboratories and Greening Labs test dozens of rotors. The results are pretty consistent. You get two to four times the life of untreated rotors. We've had rotors tested until they were beyond service limits. The results were that there was over .030" more thickness left on the treated rotor that was run on the same identical cycle as the untreated rotor.

The myth that the only thing that cryo does is cause retained austenite to convert is just that. NASA research has shown definite advantages on aluminum. (Effects of Cryogenic Treatment on the Residual Stress and Mechanical Properties of an Aerospace Aluminum Alloy, Po Chen et. al. NASA Marshall Space Flight Center) Where is the austenite in aluminum? Treatment of magnesium, titanium, copper, and other metals is common now.

No research? Hogwash. Go to http://www.cryogenicsociety.org/publications/cold_facts/current/cryogenic_processing_articles.php The Cryogenic Society of America has been helping the ASM Cryogenic Processing Sub-committee gather a list of research papers and articles about the process. Yes, ASM has a committee on the subject and recognizes the process. More research articles are being reviewed at this time.

Value to the "Bucks Down" racer? Let's see. If we get only twice the engine life, which is more expensive, rebuilding the engine or spending about $500 up front to make it last twice as long? We used to treat Erik Darnell's engines when he was an independent racer. His treated valve springs were replaced once a year. His competition replaced theirs every other race for $400/set. The $48 bucks it cost to treat the springs seems like kind of a bargain. Making brakes, transmissions, rear axles, suspension springs, sway bars etc. last longer saves costs like you would not believe.

Just one thing. Like heat treating, cryogenic processing needs to be done correctly. You cannot just dump the part into liquid nitrogen. by the way, we are now working with treatments down to -450F and getting some very interesting results.

Regards to all of you and thanks for your interest in this fascinating subject.

Rick

Doc Nickel

03-19-2010, 09:16 PM

Come on over and I will show you the data and test reports.

-Pay my airfare from Alaska, and I'll be more than happy to sit in on one of your tests.

Or go to my web page where we have published some of it.

-In other words, "go look it up yourself"? Howsabout you quote, or at least link to, the relevant portions of the appropriate documents. My frequency on this board notwithstanding, I do have work to do.

You're the one making the claim, presumably you're prepared to back it up. I'm not going to do your research for you.

I gave you a spec that tells you what the test was and I gave you the results.?

-No, you gave me the name of the SAE test spec, supposedly the 'accepted standard' for the automotive industry. In your six posts to date, I see no references to the results of any of those tests

Here (http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net/showpost.php?p=532648&postcount=51) you cite an irrelevant quote from an article about nonferrous metals. I'm reasonably certain that cast-iron brake rotors are, in fact, ferrous. You also quote what's basically a summary blurb from an article on tool steels- again, I'm reasonably sure that cast iron is not considered a "tool steel".

You then quote another paper on tool steels. Relevant, I suppose, with your discussion with Lazlo, but again, cast iron and tool steel are different materials altogether.

In your first post (http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net/showpost.php?p=532273&postcount=39), you quote nothing at all, save for a general link to a cryo database.

I quoted you the data of the wear test when we wore the rotors past service limits.

-You did? I just reread all six of your posts to date, and the only 'data' you've posted (besides an anecdotal "it's true 'cause I said so" or two) have been the above mentioned general links, or summary quotes from unrelated articles.

I'll be happy to read any actual data you might have, but as above, I'm not going to do your research for you.

That gives you the method and the results. What the heck do you want?

-Facts. Plain and simple. No offense, but I'm not going to believe you just because you say something is true. Evan and I have our differences, but one thing we share is a pretty complete lack of tolerance for pseudoscience.

I will admit I'm no expert on heat treating, beyond the relatively simple shop methods used on hardenable steels, like cold chisels. But I also know how free enterprise works, and if a relatively simple and inexpensive process like cryo-treatment can quadruple the lifespan of- in this case- a brake rotor, with no concurrent decrease in braking power, that every automaker out there would have the process integrated into their production floor.

I am not, however, closed-minded. As before, I fully admit and agree that the process does have some benefit to some materials under certain circumstances. But, I have yet to hear a valid explanation- as in, not an anecdote that breaks down to "take my word for it"- of the mechanism by which the process quadruples the lifespan of a a brake rotor.

The auto companies are scared of change and avoid it like the plague. They won't adopt cryo because the make a lot of money on repair parts. So cryo brakes would cost them a ton of money.

-Oh, horsesh*t. The snake-oilers tried that with the so-called "200-MPG" carburetor, saying the "oil companies" bought the patent so they wouldn't see a dent in fuel sales thanks to everyone having fabulously better mileage. Or any other technology some big company or the government has supposedly bought up and then hidden away.

The fact is, any automaker that can make a part last even just fifty percent longer, will implement that part in a heartbeat, because that directly affects costs. Less rotor wear means less brake problems and reduced warranty work, among other things.

Something that improved the lifespan of a part four hundred percent would be included on damn near every car on the road. Car makers make very little on repair or replacement parts- conversely, warranty repairs cost the automakers. Reduce warranty work, improve the bottom line. It's a no-brainer.

Doc.

Evan

03-19-2010, 09:27 PM

Sorry to disappoint you John, but I have made my point quite well enough. Mr. Warbird has also helped in that regard by providing conclusive proof that he isn't a metallurgist. While I am entitled to my opinion he is not entitled to misrepresent his product. As well, my opinion is not singular but is widely held by the scientific community.

BTW John, when I left Xerox my primary responsibilities were as a Senior Service Representative in networked systems and colour printing systems. I have a sheaf of credit course diplomas that are recognized for university credit.

oldtiffie

03-19-2010, 10:29 PM

This isn't as bad (good??) as the thread on the alternative to Glacern vises.

That thread seems to have disappeared into the ether.

Did George delete it?

Will he delete this one?

John Stevenson

03-20-2010, 06:02 AM

BTW John, when I left Xerox my primary responsibilities were as a Senior Service Representative in networked systems and colour printing systems. I have a sheaf of credit course diplomas that are recognized for university credit.

One of my friends has a large framed diploma on his office wall saying he's a qualified logistics engineer but at the end of the day he's still a lorry driver :D

Even our dusbin men are known as recycling engineers :rolleyes:

Evan

03-20-2010, 07:13 AM

I keep them just by the spare toilet paper John. You never know when you might need them.

John Stevenson

03-20-2010, 01:19 PM

I keep them just by the spare toilet paper John. You never know when you might need them.

Very true and you can't believe all you read anyway, I'll sort my diploma out from Oxford university.
It's a combined multi-discipline one giving me a pass with honours in Ice Cube rolling, Grevious Bodily Harm and Glue Sniffing.

Seriously.

As an aside most are not worth the paper they are written on anyway.

My qualifications from college are worthless as the course grades T1 to T6, are no longer recognised or convertible to present day qualifications and the references from the 8 or 9 jobs I have had are also worthless as none of the companies are still in business if anyone wanted to check.

I have loads of expensive embossed paper as opposed to just printed, from auctions where the firm had gone tits up, ideal for references that cannot be checked.

Evan

03-20-2010, 01:30 PM

I own property on the Moon. I have a deed that says so.

warbird

03-20-2010, 01:32 PM

-No, you gave me the name of the SAE test spec, supposedly the 'accepted standard' for the automotive industry. In your six posts to date, I see no references to the results of any of those tests

The wear is definitely less. We've had dozens of rotors test by Greening Labs and by Link Labs (independent brake testing labs) to SAE 2707 JUL 2004 METHOD B. The results show that treated rotors have two to four times the wear life of untreated rotors. We also tested two rotors to the point where they were beyond service limits. Both rotors went through the 2707 test cycles multiple times. The treated rotor was 0.031" thicker at the end of the test. (Post 52 in this series)

We tested via independent laboratories. The relevant result for test procedure SAE 2707 Jul 2004 is stated above. If you look that spec up you will see a specified procedure. What is it you need????? You need to sit in on a test done by an independent lab? Want to prove me wrong? Send me two identical rotors made by a reputable firm such as Affinia. You pay for the test. I'll even see if you can sit through the test at the lab. Bring your sleeping bag.

Some of our test results are at www.metal-wear.com/Brakes.html. There is a chart with the test results. It is at least as relevant as the charts published in this thread, and I have specified the test procedure, and the procedure was done by an independent lab.

You are looking for an explanation. I have said I don't know why it works. It is important to find out why, but I don't have the resources to find an answer. I don't know why gravity works either. That being said, we do our best to work with researchers and we are a lot closer now than we were when I got into this thing in the 1990's due to scientific discussions with responsible and curious people and the research we have contributed to.

No one knew why steel would get hard when quenched in tempered until the late 1800's. That did not stop us from hardening metals and achieving things like transcontinental railroads. The Wright brothers did not know why their wings created lift. They developed them from experiments in wing shapes. Your insistence that some scientific organization has to put a stamp of approval on a process in order for it to be real is silly.

You obviously have spent very little time in the auto industry. First of all, nothing happens in a heartbeat in the auto companies. It takes years to get something through the testing, the committees, the legal departments, the advertising departments and such.

Secondly, the auto companies make large profits on replacement parts. I just priced replacement rotors for a customer's Acura. The dealer wants $127.50 for a rotor I can get for $26.50 by going to the importer. Even if he puts a 100% markup on his costs, Honda is making a good profit on that rotor. Brakes are wear parts that are usually not covered under warranty.

I've talked with the engineers from Ford, Chrysler, and GM. They use the same silly arguments I've seen here. They are scared silly of change. I've talked with major brake producers. We went into one producer who tested our process and got four times the life. (their test, not ours) They admitted we got four times the life and proclaimed it "insignificant". They were scared of losing sales. The pity is that they will lose sales when people start demanding this.

I've worked for automotive the auto industry and their suppliers. I've done projects for Ford, GM and American Motors. I was an engineer/metallurgist for Fel-Pro. That is where I got involved with cryogenics.

I do not comprehend how you can call testing to an SAE standard by a well known independent lab pseudoscience. That staggers the imagination. I've given you a database to go and read papers in. You seem very resistant to that.

Evan

03-20-2010, 03:26 PM

No one knew why steel would get hard when quenched in tempered until the late 1800's.

For somebody that claims to be a metallurgist you are strikingly uninformed on the subject. Heat treating, quenching and tempering has been known for over 3000 years. The oldest quench hardened knife is dated to 1100 BC.

You are looking for an explanation. I have said I don't know why it works. It is important to find out why, but I don't have the resources to find an answer.

Are you admitting that your detailed pseudoscientific explanations given earlier in this thread are actually BS?

Your insistence that some scientific organization has to put a stamp of approval on a process in order for it to be real is silly.

You don't seem to understand. IF the process actually worked it would be standardised so that it could be repeated by all and sundry to the standard specification. Since it doesn't work a specification cannot be written. It isn't about approval, it's about standards that can be relied on to produce a quantifiable result.

small.planes

03-20-2010, 03:44 PM

No one knew why steel would get hard when quenched in tempered until the late 1800's. (Emphasis Mine)

For somebody that claims to be a metallurgist you are strikingly uninformed on the subject. Heat treating, quenching and tempering has been known for over 3000 years. The oldest quench hardened knife is dated to 1100 BC.

So the ancient 'dudes' (for want of knowing which ancient peoples you are actually referring to) knew the atomic structures of the metals they were hardening and exactly which crystal formations gave them the properties?
I think not. The fact they did it without having the stamp of approval from some scientific body is the point you deliberately ignored.

Dave

warbird

03-20-2010, 04:20 PM

Obviously you didn't read what I wrote. I see a definite pattern here. Nobody knew WHY steel got hard until the late 1800's. My point, which went sailing by you, is that we do not have to understand why something works to use it. Please read more carefully. Your determination to find fault is blinding you.

I have given you theories. Some of them are as yet unproven. That does not make them BS. At least I admit what I do not know. You KNOW that cryo is pseudo science and that is the end of the story.

Here is how science moves forward. Someone comes up with an idea as to why what he has observed happened. It gets discussed by reasonable people. Maybe even brainstormed a bit. Then experiments are done and the idea is proven or disproved. The idea is modified. repeat, etc. I (and a whole lot of other people) have noticed that brakes last longer. I had brakes tested. They lasted longer in an industry accepted test, repeatedly. I am working on why. In the mean time, there is no reason not to use the process.

Your method seems to be to try to make someone look the fool to prove something or other, we don't know what. You insist that it does not work in the face of industry standard tests that prove it does. You cling tightly to a few tests that seem to show negative results. Cryo not working in one paper when used on a cobalt containing alloy becomes it can't work on anything. You are the one in the pseudo science game. The reality is that those results are another piece in the puzzle that will eventually define cryo. In the mean time we work to find out more.

Your logic is faulty to extremes. You state that "IF the process actually worked it would be standardised so that it could be repeated by all and sundry to the standard specification. Since it doesn't work a specification cannot be written." Who is going to write a standard? Nobody is going to write a spec on a process that isn't in use. We are finding the uses. In time specs will be written. That will not happen overnight. The ASM committee on the process is trying to encourage research into what we all have seen happening. Large corporations are beginning to work with us. Air Liquide (the largest liquid nitrogen producer in the world) has decided to partner with Controlled Thermal Processing because they have seen what we can do.

It is only a matter of time before you are proven wrong, and I believe that I will put part of these conversations on my website as a prime example of the sillyness of some people.

Dave,
Thanks, my point precisely.

Evan

03-20-2010, 05:11 PM

Obviously you didn't read what I wrote. I see a definite pattern here. Nobody knew WHY steel got hard until the late 1800's. My point, which went sailing by you, is that we do not have to understand why something works to use it. Please read more carefully. Your determination to find fault is blinding you.

How do you know that they didn't know why? The first recorded steel was made during the Qin Dynasty of the first emperor of China. That means they understood the importance of carbon as an adjunct to iron and how much should be present. They knew more than that as well. The reason we know they had steel is that some of the weapons buried with the emperor are black chrome plated to preserve them. That process wasn't rediscovered until WWII by the Germans.

As for knowing how something works, we know how metals interact at the atomic level. It is very well understood. There are no gaping holes in our understanding that would allow something like cryo-treatment to remain unexplained unless it is inexplicable because it doesn't make scientific sense.

The supposed cryotreatment "process" is a sham, a scam and a scientific non entity. Note I am not accusing you of perpetrating a scam, you may well believe that it works. I think I commented much earlier that you will do well to distinguish between what you know and what you believe.

That is very difficult for many people. That includes all professions and disciplines including the sciences. The blind are those that take information about our reality on faith and don't know enough to question if what they are told is really possible. You appear to be among that group.

lazlo

03-20-2010, 05:29 PM

This is an amusing talk that Rick gave to the Philadelphia chapter of the American Society of Metals in 2004:

Each year, cryogenic processing gains a bigger beachhead in industry. Yet it remains a controversial subject, especially among metallurgists. No one can explain exactly why the process achieves its astounding results, and it is often hard to separate legitimate claims from the hype created by hucksters. This talk will summarize the history of the process, talk about recent research, explore some of the silly myths, and give an overview of current applications.

...and here Rick is involved in almost the exact same flame war on the Firing Lines, using the same brake rotor arguments and citations for cryogenic treatment of rifle barrels. They're not buying it either:

http://www.thefiringline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=397263

Cryo Barrels

Howard31
Member

Twenty years ago it was popular with match shooters.It has somewhat died out.Evidently the results weren't worth the cost. It was one of those things that sounded good in theory.

...

Chaz88
Senior Member

When I used to follow the knife making world closely there was a lot of talk about using this in the heat treatment process. The companies that did it swore by it and everyone else thought it was unlikely it made much difference.

mete
Senior Member

It's BS !! There has been photos of non-cryo and cryo barrels on the Benelli website and it's just not possible to get those microstructures .[even though I like and own a benelli !] NRA and some top barrel makers did tests and found no benefit .The one that makes claims just happens to have the equipment !
As far as knives this is a bit different and cryo can be beneficial depending on the steel. Better results on stainless steels.The process however must be part of the heat treating process not something done afterwards ! I have discussed this at great length on some of the knife forums as I am a metallurgist advising custom knife makers.
It is a great embarassment to me as a metallurgist to see all the hype given to cryo as only some of it has been proven and that is reducing the amount of retained autenite in the steel.

warbird

03-20-2010, 05:58 PM

Evan

There is no evidence at all that the ancient Chinese or anyone else knew anything about the atomic structure of steel. They very well could have and very well might have hardened steel, there is no evidence that they knew why it got hard. Using your logic, we have not found their papers on the subject, so they do not exist. When you find the papers let me know.

People swore up and down that the Wright brothers had not flown up until about 1909. They called them Liars, not Flyers. This in spite of pictures of their plane in the air and their numerous public flight in Ohio. The French were astounded when Wilbur got in, took off and flew circles.

I've posted results of industry standard tests. I've shown you where to go to get more information. In the mean time, I've got to go arrange for some more research. A Prof at Wayne State tells me his results are good and he wants to apply for some government funding to find out why. That is a much better use of my time than trying to get some guy to look at reality.

Doc Nickel

03-20-2010, 06:13 PM

(We tested via independent laboratories. The relevant result for test procedure SAE 2707 Jul 2004 is stated above. If you look that spec up you will see a specified procedure.

Results without method are irrelevant. As noted, I could get 400% better life out of an untreated rotor by reducing the braking power 80%. Or I could remove the caliper altogether and state with all honesty the lifespan of the rotor is now effectively infinite.

Concurrently, method without results is also irrelevant. The finest, most detailed test spec a team of MIT chess club alumni can churn out, is worthless until applied, and only marginally less so if applied but the results not recorded.

Show me the data. Then we'll talk.

Doc.

Doc Nickel

03-20-2010, 06:15 PM

I've posted results of industry standard tests.

-No, you haven't. You posted the test spec, not the results.

There's a difference.

Doc.

Evan

03-20-2010, 07:06 PM

There is no evidence at all that the ancient Chinese or anyone else knew anything about the atomic structure of steel. They very well could have and very well might have hardened steel, there is no evidence that they knew why it got hard. Using your logic, we have not found their papers on the subject, so they do not exist. When you find the papers let me know.

You can't get off the hook on a single word. It isn't relevant to your claims but only to your apparent lack of knowledge of metals. You claimed to know why the treatment works and offered us explanations accordingly that are nonsense. Are you disclaiming those words you wrote? It seems so. In that case what are you selling? If I buy your service how do I verify that you actually did anything to my material? What test can I run that will unequivocally identify a part that has been treated? How does it affect the certification of my material such as an aircraft bolt or cylinder head or con rod or a propellor?

You aren't allowed to treat those parts, are you? It will destroy the certification of the parts since the process isn't part of the certified process. You are making money from gullible hot rodders that also believe that billet aluminum is something other than a cast block of metal which is how all aluminum is made. You sell your services to people that think American Hotrod is a reality show.

Machinists, especially experienced ones are some of the highest educated "blue collar" workers in the work force. They know what materials are and what make them do what they do. Top machinists have more practical knowledge of metallurgy than anybody else in the workforce. They can run their machines by ear and judge the alloys by eye and if you could do anything to a piece of steel that made it different in properties by 400% it would be a different material and we know that. Machinists are the group that you can't fool all of the time and for many none of the time.

Now, I have some laser cutting to post.

ADGO_Racing

03-20-2010, 07:19 PM

I don't know how you say I THINK brake rotors last longer, or that valve springs last longer, or that quantifiable bore measurements are THINKING that the process works. Either the rotors last or they don't, either valve springs last or they don't, either the bore warps or it doesn't. This is not "Believing, or "Thinking" it produces results, this is KNOWING it produces results.

As for the "Written specs" As Warbird says the ancient people did not have a "spec" for making steel. The village steel maker made the steel, only he knew the "recipe". It wasn't until the late 1800's that specs came into common existence. Also early on in any process, the people doing it are much like the ancient people, it is new, no one else knows the recipe. It takes time to write a spec, as many different heads are involved. It also requires testing to prove the spec, this takes some time. I know this probably hurts some peoples heads, but I do not trust my government, or any other government for that matter, to give me a spec. I would much rather rely on private industry to make the "specs". They have more to lose if it is not correct. Also regarding specs, today we like to know WHY a process works before writing a spec. Cryogenics is still a relatively new science, we are still in the process of figuring out the WHY's.

Admittedly it does not work on all materials (If you read my posts, I NEVER said it does). Admittedly it is more effective for some companies than others. This is where the research takes time. Sorting out WHO it works for, and WHY it works for them. Then, and only then, can the repeatable process can be written as a spec. Some guys who do it are snake oil salesmen, some places do it properly, and have positive results. I have two places locally who preform the service. One place is a bunch of hacks, and never get any positive measurable results. The other place I use, is a professional outfit, with a quality process, that produces measurable results.

Doc Nickel

03-20-2010, 08:40 PM

I don't know how you say I THINK brake rotors last longer, or that valve springs last longer, or that quantifiable bore measurements are THINKING that the process works.

-Because at the moment all we have to go on is you word. You say X part does Y. You say Z part last Q longer. You say F team gets D more miles out of T part.

As the bright guys often note, the plural of anecdote is not data.

Over on the PM board a few years back, we had a sixty-page, thousand-post thread on dowsing. You know, using the forked sticks to find water? Perhaps as many as a third of the respondents to that thread stated something varying from 100% belief in dowsing to a noncommital "there might be something to it"- with a few vociferous folks giving endless lists of reasons how it could work or how it was supposed to work.

Taken as an aggregate, there were probably fifty or sixty or more anecdotes on the effectiveness of dowsing- My kid tried it and found ma's car keys, my neighbor tried it and found his hidden water line, my brother hired a guy to witch a well and that well has been working fine these past forty years, etcetera, ad nauseum.

That's why science rests so heavily on the idea of 'peer reviewed'. I can publish any results I want, but if the science doesn't hold up and no other team or lab can duplicate the results, then we know the "facts" my results came up with aren't solid, and being a good scientist, I'd head back to the drawing board to see where I went wrong.

Or, if I were Al Gore, I'd just tell everyone how many other scientists agree with me, point out how a slightly-heavier-then-usual rainstorm can be interpreted as evidence for my theory, and call anyone that disagrees with me a "denialist".

But I digress. :D

Now, ADGO, take a moment and cool off, then reread what I've been saying. I'm a bit more of a believer than Evan is, in that I agree the process has some benefit on certain alloys- again, alloys already formulated to be specifically receptive to heat treatment.

But, there's just no way I can swallow Warbird's 400% improvement- again, that borders on transmuting the iron into an entirely different material.

And getting back to my above references to test methodology, even when referring to the improved lifespan of the springs, the parameters of that test are not known. Were the untreated springs exactly the same- apart from the treatment- as the previous set of springs? Was anything else changed, like the cam profile, the lifters, the pushrod length, the installed valve height, the retainers and keepers, etc? Are they using the exact same rockers?

Say they swapped over to the cryo-treated springs. But the old supplier didn't have treated springs, so they went with a different brand. At the same time, you swapped over to a lighter weight valve, switched the heavy retainers for light titanium, and finally dropped in that roller cam.

Last year you wore out a set of springs every two races, this year a set lasts a full season. Which change led to the improvement? Heck, it could be something completely external, like adding a rev limiter to prevent the top-end valve float as the car was going through the traps. That alone could have been responsible for that much improvement.

Now, that's all supposition, but that's why we need a test methodology and the results. Years ago, NASCAR found both their tires and brakes lasting longer, why was that? Because that was the year they mandated the restrictor plates, which reduced the top speeds. That's relevant data we need to analyze the results.

Warbird says Porsche was getting better results- were they using the same car, the same suspension geometry, the same tires, the same shocks, the same calipers, the same pads? For that matter was it even the same track and the same driver? All of that matters, any of them can skew the results.

Doc.

Tobias-B

03-20-2010, 10:38 PM

Different metals react differently during cryo treating.

well, you could say the same thing about heat treating, too.

Except that the people who make steel call out lots of pretty darn precise treatments
for their steel and offer up numbers you can expect after these treatments.

I've heard some anecdotes at the race track- but no real 'evidence'
either, in the form of 'we bought 8 rotors and had 4 cryo treated and
then this happened. Just "they last a lot longer".

I guess if I was backed into a corner I might try it for sh*ts and giggles,
(rotors for a spec RX7 class, for example)
but until the steel makers start offering real numbers, I have a hard
time spending money on it.

t

warbird

03-21-2010, 11:56 AM

Doc:

If you read the test spec you will see that the procedure is spelled out in detail. You have to follow the spec's directions. The tests were done at independent laboratories. They had no reason to not follow the spec. That is why we have SAE specs, so all the testing is comparative. Stop clinging to the idea that I sneaked into Greening's laboratory and decalibrated their brake dyno. I have given you the relevant resulting data. .031 in more wear on the untreated rotor. Go to my web page to see the graph of the comparison of rotor wear.

You have a simple minded idea as to why something wears. Wear is a lot more complicated than just tensile strength and such. I proved that at Fel Pro where the simple minded tool makers did not know what grinding burn was. I gave them 2.3 times the life on their dies by showing them how to sharpen them without grinding burn. Same die, same metal, just do it right.

Evan
Victor Aviation, one of the nation's premier piston aviation engine rebuilders uses cryogenics with the full knowledge and and approval of the FAA.

lazlo

03-21-2010, 12:21 PM

Victor Aviation, one of the nation's premier piston aviation engine rebuilders uses cryogenics with the full knowledge and and approval of the FAA.

Rick, you pitched cryo for FAA use on Engr Tips, and if you recall, you were admonished that the FAA does not approve cryogenic treatment for improving wear resistance:

http://www.eng-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=7&page=1

Fredrick,

No FAR's (Federal Aviation Regulations) are going to stop you, however there are FAR's that spell out procedures to follow when major engine work is done. FAR 43 Appendix A and B.

Check out the link below: http://www.moneypit.net/~pratt/ac43/nk

Currently, the most commonly used methods for providing a hard wearing surface in aircraft reciprocating engine cylinders is chrome-plating and nitriding. The processes are quite different as you may know.

warbird

03-21-2010, 06:15 PM

That was then, this is now. Things change with time. Believe it or not, we have been working to make the process acceptable. I never said Victor uses it for wear resistance. http://www.victor-aviation.com/nav.shtml?cryogenic.shtml

hornluv

03-21-2010, 06:34 PM

However, the "snake oil" part comes in when they start selling us "cryo" treatments for things that really aren't affected by heat-treating (cryo or otherwise.) Like the so-called better sound out of brass instruments. Sure, brass needs to be periodically annealed as it's worked to make the instrument, but will heat-treating and "tempering" actually change the sound?

Doc, I wholeheartedly agree with you. It is a huge fad among brass instrumentalists, one that thankfully seems to be fading, to get their instruments frozen. As an instrument maker, I talk pretty regularly with other makers and repairmen. One such colleague has a metallurgist for an uncle and they did tests on brass before and after freezing. No change. That probably has something to do with brass NOT being steel. It doesn't machine or work like steel, it isn't heat treatable like steel, it doesn't have different types of grain structure like steel, and the two aren't even made of the same constituent elements, yet for some reason people expect a process that works well on steel will do the same wonders for brass. I think any change experienced by the player is psychosomatic.

Doc Nickel

03-21-2010, 06:40 PM

If you read the test spec you will see that the procedure is spelled out in detail. You have to follow the spec's directions.

-And for the third time, the procedure is not the result.

The procedure is how you get the results.

I want to see the results. The actual hard data. If said data is contained therein, please post a link to it.

The tests were done at independent laboratories. They had no reason to not follow the spec.

-And I never said they didn't. But so far, all we have, unless I've missed something, is your link to an SAE test specification- in other words, a description of how the test should be conducted.

Apart from that, I have yet to see either the name of the independent laboratory or their results.

I have given you the relevant resulting data.

-No, you haven't. How the test was run is an entirely different animal from the results of said test.

Go to my web page to see the graph of the comparison of rotor wear.

-Is that the "independent" laboratory's results?

If so, where might I find those lab results other than on your website? No offense, I'd have been happy to give you the benefit of the doubt a few days ago, but intentional obfuscation and a repeated confusion conflating test results with testing methodology doesn't exactly fill me with a sense of trust.

Doc.

Doc Nickel

03-21-2010, 06:44 PM

I never said Victor uses it for wear resistance.

-No, but you are saying racers and Porsche teams do. 0.031" less wear than the untreated rotor, according to you.

Doc.

John Stevenson

03-21-2010, 07:05 PM

There is no evidence at all that the ancient Chinese or anyone else knew anything about the atomic structure of steel. They very well could have and very well might have hardened steel, there is no evidence that they knew why it got hard. Using your logic, we have not found their papers on the subject, so they do not exist. When you find the papers let me know.

In medieval times steel was hardened by heating up to cherry red and dipping into the blood of a virgin.

Do you think the lack of virgins and the lack of accredited data on Cyro has anything in common ?

.

Rigger

03-21-2010, 07:15 PM

God dammit John,

ROTFLMAO

That's another keyboard wasted and that guy opposite in the mess is getting real fed up of wiping food off his fatigues :D

Rigger.

Evan

03-21-2010, 07:35 PM

I think we need to review a few questions that were never addressed. One at a time so they don't get skipped.

If I send something in to be cryo treated how can I tell that it has been treated when I get it back? How do I measure the remakable change that has occured on each type of product? How can I tell that it wasn't accidentally skipped and not treated at all?

Doc Nickel

03-21-2010, 07:52 PM

Just check it with a dowsing rod.

(Sorry, I had to. :D )

Doc.

warbird

03-21-2010, 09:04 PM

As an instrument maker, I talk pretty regularly with other makers and repairmen. One such colleague has a metallurgist for an uncle and they did tests on brass before and after freezing. No change.

So somebody you talk'd to's uncle did some tests and found nothing. That should work for most of the guys on this thread. What tests did they do, where is the data, what were they looking for?

As to not giving lab names:

The wear is definitely less. We've had dozens of rotors test by Greening Labs and by Link Labs (independent brake testing labs) to SAE 2707 JUL 2004 METHOD B. The results show that treated rotors have two to four times the wear life of untreated rotors. We also tested two rotors to the point where they were beyond service limits. Both rotors went through the 2707 test cycles multiple times. The treated rotor was 0.031" thicker at the end of the test. Post 52

There are the two labs we used and the results of one of the tests.

Evan

03-21-2010, 09:12 PM

How do I verify a cryo treated part?

John Stevenson

03-21-2010, 09:19 PM

Why does a Google search on SAE 2707 JUL 2004 METHOD B. only bring up post made by you and not Greening, Links Lab or the SAE ?

Where are their results?

Doc Nickel

03-21-2010, 09:45 PM

Why do the top three Google results for "Link Labs" and "brakes" come up with posts, from you, in other boards, about the brake treatment, but no connections to the labs' website, if it has one, or any actual test results?

I'm starting to think the earlier reply was right; you're Google-trolling bulletin boards for references to "cryo treatment" so you can jump in and talk it up, ostensibly in the attempt to some spin positive PR.

On the VW board, you joined within a day or two of somebody mentioning "cryo doesn't work", made two posts extolling the process' virtues, and haven't returned in a year.

On the Impala board, you joined a week after somebody asked about front brake wear, made three posts extolling the virtues of your process, and again, haven't been back in a year.

On the LWRC boards, you joined the week of the thread, posted once.

Here, you joined virtually the day somebody asked about cryo treatment, and posted a nearly word-for-word copy of what you put up on the other two boards.

Once is an accident, twice is a coincidence, three times is enemy action, four times is an institutionalized long-term strategy.

Warbird is a sales and PR shill for a company selling snake oil. Period, end of conversation.

Doc.

Evan

03-21-2010, 09:53 PM

I don't think having people find this thread will do him much good. One thing he isn't is a metallurgist.

John Stevenson

03-21-2010, 10:02 PM

Best thing is to keep it running so it heads up google

ckelloug

03-21-2010, 10:46 PM

I don't have a dog in this fight but standards are usually difficult to search. Especially obsure ones. I did this search however and did find the proper technical standard for break wear under the number given although the available standard is a later revision than the cited one. http://www.sae.org/technical/standards/J2707_200502

oldtiffie

03-21-2010, 11:06 PM

Originally Posted by warbird

There is no evidence at all that the ancient Chinese or anyone else knew anything about the atomic structure of steel. They very well could have and very well might have hardened steel, there is no evidence that they knew why it got hard. Using your logic, we have not found their papers on the subject, so they do not exist. When you find the papers let me know.

In medieval times steel was hardened by heating up to cherry red and dipping into the blood of a virgin.

Do you think the lack of virgins and the lack of accredited data on Cyro has anything in common ?

.

Is this you - or Richard Branson? - getting more of the required test equipment back to UK - aka "Blighty", "The Old Dart" etc?

You do not seem to understand the concept of an independent laboratory. An independent testing lab performs tests for companies. Their results become the property of the company that paid for the testing. They do not publish their client's results. In our case they performed tests using SAE 2707 JUL 2004 METHOD B. I have given you the results. They are also published on my website.

I'm more interested in why you have accepted the conclusions of the testing of Hornluver's acquaintance's uncle's research on brass with all its sparkling detail. Is that because it fits your agenda? Evan, you can see if something is cryo'd by contacting this guy. He will give you the results you want.

In my first post I told you I own a company that does cryogenics. I have an interest in pointing out things about the process. I have an interest in cryo, not in VW's or illiterate machinists.

You fellows have no interest in finding out about this process or in carrying on an intelligent discussion. I have come to the conclusion that the correspondents in this board are basically a bunch of psychopathic illiterates who like to feign a knowledge of science.

bye

Evan

03-22-2010, 12:02 PM

I'm more interested in why you have accepted the conclusions of the testing of Hornluver's acquaintance's uncle's research on brass with all its sparkling detail. Is that because it fits your agenda? Evan, you can see if something is cryo'd by contacting this guy. He will give you the results you want.

That isn't an answer.

You fellows have no interest in finding out about this process or in carrying on an intelligent discussion. I have come to the conclusion that the correspondents in this board are basically a bunch of psychopathic illiterates who like to feign a knowledge of science.

That is simply hilarious. I guess Mr Warbird finally hit a crowd that he can't fool. That is a particularly humiliating event for most scammers.

I agree John, we should bump this up from time to time on a slow day. What works best in Google is to post the odd link to it on other web sites. By doing that Google will rate it as more important and our scammer friend is going to have to change his identity to escape it.

Doc Nickel

03-22-2010, 04:57 PM

They do not publish their client's results.

-Then in my opinion those results are worthless. If the only place I can get a copy of the data is from the group selling the process- in other words, people with a definite financial interest in the outcome of the tests- then I have every reason to be mistrustful of the data.

This thread and your activities in it and others like it, only weakens the credibility of what little data you provide. You get argumentive and abusive when questioned, your reply to inquiries boils down to "look it up yourself!", and you get angry and petulant when we don't blindly accept your data just on your say-so.

I'm more interested in why you have accepted the conclusions of the testing of Hornluver's acquaintance's uncle's research on brass with all its sparkling detail.

-Because his "conclusion" makes no claim. No claim the horns "sounded better", or will last "400% longer", etc. Moreover, "nothing happened" is precisely the result any decent machinist can expect from heat-treating brass.

Your conclusion makes a claim- IE, that the horn "sounds" better. You know, like the stereo guys that buy the $7,000 speaker cables (http://www.edn.com/blog/1700000170/post/1150015315.html) or the $25 felt-tip pens (http://www.elusivedisc.com/prodinfo.asp?number=AP-CDSL) or the $50 wall outlets (http://www.dedicatedaudio.com/power_outlets), all of which are marketed to dolts that think they make their stereo "sound" better.

All of those have been proven fraudulent, being wholly undetectable when subjected to proper double-blind testing.

Doc.

lazlo

03-22-2010, 05:05 PM

Your conclusion makes a claim- IE, that the horn "sounds" better. You know, like the stereo guys that buy the $7,000 speaker cables (http://www.edn.com/blog/1700000170/post/1150015315.html) or the $25 felt-tip pens (http://www.elusivedisc.com/prodinfo.asp?number=AP-CDSL) or the $50 wall outlets (http://www.dedicatedaudio.com/power_outlets), all of which are marketed to dolts that think they make their stereo "sound" better.

All of those have been proven fraudulent, being wholly undetectable when subjected to proper double-blind testing.

I was on the fence about cryogenic quench until this thread. Cameron and I have even exchanged emails discussing it in the past. But Rick's huckstering, complete lack of data and citing papers that don't support his claims has me all but convinced now that this truly is snake oil. The comparison to $1,000 speaker cables is so perfect...

I sent this privately to Evan earlier in the thread. The American Society of Metals has a report that summarizes the state of Cryogenic treatments. It's a paid report, but the summary is as follows:

Current Status of the Cryogenic Treatment Industry: A USA Market Survey

"Its purported benefits have been embraced and promoted by some, and dismissed by others. While technical data and analysis has been generated by a variety of independent sources, it can generally be characterized most distinctly for its incompleteness. Simply put, there is not enough available published research to validate all of the claims of cryogenic treatment proponents, nor of its detractors."

macona

03-22-2010, 05:18 PM

Doc, you missed the $148 outlets on that same site. What a joke...

Speaking of cryo, here is a review cryo treated wall outlets. The reviewer got sucked in. I wish he would use a spectrum analyzer before and after instead of relying on what he thinks he hears:

http://www.audiophilia.com/hardware/ma6.htm

Warbird, what people want here are scans of the official documents from the testing labs. Anything else is here-say. Anecdotal evidence from someone who has something to benefit by it is not going to go over well.

lazlo

03-22-2010, 05:57 PM

Speaking of cryo, here is a review cryo treated wall outlets. The reviewer got sucked in. I wish he would use a spectrum analyzer before and after instead of relying on what he thinks he hears:

http://www.audiophilia.com/hardware/ma6.htm

:eek:

"For $40.00US you get a 'Cryogenically-treated', silver-plated duplex wall outlet. In addition, the elements are made of high content brass (at least 70% copper), which is also better for conductivity. The cryogenic process is designed to rearrange the molecular structure by immersing it in liquid nitrogen, around minus 400 degrees F! ACME uses JENA Labs and Kimber Cable for their cryogenic processing. The result of this frigid bath appears to improve the flow of electrons, or so we're told."

jungle_geo

03-22-2010, 07:08 PM

From "Acme Audio Labs Wall Outlet":
"The result of this frigid bath appears to improve the flow of electrons, or so we're told."

LMAO!!!

Even if it is true what they claim, what about the rest of the system....from the power station to your outlet? From the outlet to the power cord on the amplifier and the internals of the amp???? LOL Maybe only the electrons in the outlet are important. Or maybe the outlet puts a special spin on them.

Also: "According to the manufacturer, the unit needs thirty days to fully achieve its performance level."

Yeah that is so your check clears and now you are stuck with it.
I can't take this any more, your guys are killing me!

And the review states:
"Something was definitely happening and it was all good. What I said earlier about quieter background and an ease of presentation was even more apparent. What was also becoming more apparent was that instead of a flat, two dimensional, black background one typically hears, was a background that was characterized by a blackness that had a three dimensional spatiality to it engendering a feeling of anticipation and excitement. "

Three dimensional blackness....oh here we go...moonbeams and space aliens...

I haven't laughed this hard in a long time....thanks!

Doc Nickel

03-22-2010, 07:36 PM

I can't take this any more, your guys are killing me!

-Don't tell me this is the first time you've run across "audiophile" voodoo...

This is only the tip of the iceberg! While the "$7,000" cables are something of an outlier, you can easily find $500 and $1,000 cables all day long. All they are, are stranded copper zip-cord with fancy RCA connectors at each end.

Some are even marked with the direction the signal is supposed to flow.

They hype them us as "oxygen free" copper, or harp on the fine strands improving the surface effect and so on. As you might expect, they're indistinguishable either by ear or by sensitive electronic testing equipment, from $0.79 a foot Radio Shack lamp cord.

But the "audiophiles" buy them by the palletload. That's what got Monster going, was horrifically expensive cables- which they've used to branch out to specialty power strips and even "signal improving" cords for your video game controllers.

If you look around, you'll find all sorts of things marketed to the money-heavy but brain-light audio dolts. Knobs, for instance. You can buy handmade knobs for your stereo that are purported to improve sound, via some manner of tech-speak voodoo.

They'll sell you rocks. Yes, rocks- you just have to place them near your turntable, where they help absorb excess vibrations.

Oh lord yes. Were I not an ethical man, I could be a millionaire right now, selling vastly-overpriced trinkets to stereo enthusiasts who convince themselves they can hear the difference after paying an electrician $400 to replace $200 worth of outlets in his "listening room".

Doc.

Evan

03-22-2010, 08:21 PM

I would like to know how many of the "cryo treating" outfits do nothing more than hold the items for a week and then ship it back.

Ian B

03-23-2010, 03:12 PM

Thanks for the link to the cryo-treated wall sockets. I see no reason to limit their benefits to the audiophiles of this world - I'm looking at buying one for my lathe.

With properly aligned electrons flowing smoothly through the power cable, it *must* reduce workpiece vibration and make the machine a whole lot more accurate.

I can't wait!

Ian

ACF

03-24-2010, 12:44 AM

Hey ADGO Racing,

It looks like someone else has found a use for cryo other than youself.
I watched a show about Benelli cryo treating their shotgun barrels and chokes. If this works, you can find the info here

www.benelliusa.com/innovations/crio_system.php

If cryo is giving your engines more power or longevity I'd keep using it. I've found that it's not good to mess with success. Just my 2 cents worth.

Chris

Evan

03-24-2010, 01:34 AM

If cryo is giving your engines more power or longevity I'd keep using it. I've found that it's not good to mess with success. Just my 2 cents worth.

It's one of those things where it is the thought that counts. :D

As I said earlier the most effective weight loss treatments are the ones that are the most expensive. It doesn't matter how they supposedly work.

ADGO_Racing

03-24-2010, 02:28 AM

I don't know....I have certainly been convinced by Evan that it is VooDoo...I am also seriously re-thinking internal ceramic coatings on piston tops, combustion chambers, valve faces, ports, and headers...I'll probably stop wasting my money on other Voodoo such as dry film lubricant coatings on bearings, journals, and piston skirts too.

Sad to think I have wasted customers money on all of this voodoo....:eek:

I really think the sad part is people who never accept that there are things which work. I am sure CNC, CAD/CAM, Email and a whole host of other technologies are Voodoo too. No possible way CNC could even remotely do things as well as a manual machine. I am sure we will never see the same quality of work again, that we had when we used a water wheel, line shafting and flat belts.

I as well as a fair number of engine builders have a mountain of actual, quantifiable results that prove the process to be of value. I have far more education than most of them and on average, as much hands on experience as they do. I don't do things that don't contribute to the end result. If I cannot quantify it, I do not use it. The one place I can definitely show a reasonable improvement is in spec engines. Series who try to control every aspect of the engine. It is invisible, only myself and my vendor can tell if it was done.

I have a couple motors currently in a spec series, which win regularly, and have been completely torn down several times, and have been gone over with a fine tooth comb. I'll admit, there are a few other tricks up my sleeve, but the process contributes to the base line on the dyno. There are other areas where I have found 35-45 additional HP over the competition. But the same engine, same parts, same clearances, same dyno, same timing, only difference being cryo, will yield a consistent measurable difference, when you are trying to squeeze every last horse out of it.

Why would you rethink things that have a solid scientific reason and actual explicable mechanism of operation?

I really think the sad part is people who never accept that there are things which work. I am sure CNC, CAD/CAM, Email and a whole host of other technologies are Voodoo too.

They are to those without the scientific background to understand how such things work.

Arthur C Clarke once wrote "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"

We live in an age where plain "common sense" fails utterly to explain how things work. 99 percent of the population cannot give a coherent explanation of why pressing a button on a hand held plastic box makes another plastic box in the room change it's method of operation.

With sufficient education the reason this occurs is clear. It means knowing why the changes take place in matter that eventually result in the effect at a distance the makes the TV change channels. When I say "knowing" I don't mean hand waving explanations such as "pressing the button sends a signal..."

I mean an explanation such as "Pressing the membrane switch on the keyboard of the remote closes a contact that consists of a rubberized carbon compound which makes physical contact with a pair of traces of copper metal that have been etched to a particular pattern on a piece of fiberglass reinforced plastic. Electrons then flow through the circuit at a velocity of several inches per second which has the effect of transmitting a potential field difference at approximately half the speed of light in a vacuum through those copper traces to the insulated gate of a field effect transistor. The field effect transistor is part of an integrated circuit made by the Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) process. ....."

No such explanation exists for a plausible mechanism of operation of so called cryo treatment. It does for the various other treatments you mention.

It is invisible, only myself and my vendor can tell if it was done.

That is the difference and it is the difference between the domain of scientific reality and and pseudo scientific Bull Shlt.

Arcane

03-24-2010, 05:52 AM

You know, I don't think there is a bigger group of people in NA who exhibit the "Yellow Dot" syndrome than racers, (excluding goofball audiophiles). Go faster than the pack, and if you have a something different somewhere on or in your car, you better believe next race day, someone else will have copied it..just in case that was the "magic elixir of speed"! Considering the high number of racers in NA and the haste with which they will spend cubic dollars to go a little bit faster, one would think there would be a whole lot more cryo shops around than what there are...just saying.

Evan

03-24-2010, 07:04 AM

You know, I don't think there is a bigger group of people in NA who exhibit the "Yellow Dot" syndrome than racers,

According to actual public opinion polls slightly over half of Americans believe that UFOs are real and half of those are convinced they are alien spaceships. A lot of those people think Men in Black was a documentary....

Doc Nickel

03-24-2010, 08:18 AM

I don't know....I have certainly been convinced by Evan that it is VooDoo...I am also seriously re-thinking internal ceramic coatings on piston tops, combustion chambers, valve faces, ports, and headers...I'll probably stop wasting my money on other Voodoo such as dry film lubricant coatings on bearings, journals, and piston skirts too.

-With this many straw men, there's gotta be a pony around here somewhere...

Let's see, on one hand, we have coatings that are not only visible and measurable, but also testable even in the home workshop with simple tools. A common propane torch and a non-contact IR thermometer would suffice to compare a coated piston to an uncoated one.

On the other, we have a treatment that, at absolute best, would require testing the part to destruction, or sectioning the metal and subjecting it to x-ray crystallography to detect what changes, if any, there were to the grain structures.

As Evan suggests, it would be entirely possible to run a "cryo treatment" company from nothing more than a PO Box. Simply receive the part, open the box, wait a week, enclose an invoice, seal the box back up, charge the credit card. Slap a suitably scribbled part tracking tag on it for good measure, and no one could tell the difference.

As the audiophile examples clearly illustrate, the recipients of the parts will gladly believe their rifle shoots better, their brakes will last longer, their tuba sounds 'crisper' and their valvesprings will last all season.

Or are you saying that silver-plated contacts in the wall outlet can actually make a stereo sound better? Or that it matters which direction the signal is flowing through some speaker cables?

Oh, wait- the barrel also uses an entirely different choke- it's not only longer, but uses a much more gradual taper for the constriction. Since the choke is designed to modify the shot pattern- that's it's whole purpose- which is more likely to have an effect on the shot pattern: A slight change in the barrel heat treatment, or a major change in the choke constriction?

However, I'm still waiting to hear, from way back at the beginning of the thread, just how you think the actual mechanism works, for the cryo to improve HP in your engines.

I posted a premise or suggestion that cryo can help stabilize a new casting, so that, with the proper additional work, the bores will remain rounder, longer.

But now you're implying that you can show me two identical motors, that were built the same, speced the same, and using the same parts, save for one had an unspecified number of unnamed parts cryo-treated, a treatment which has produced an additional 40+ HP.

I am dying to hear just how you think that's supposed to work.

Doc.

John Stevenson

03-24-2010, 09:18 AM

I would like to know how many of the "cryo treating" outfits do nothing more than hold the items for a week and then ship it back.
Ok guys I feel the need for some $$$$ so I'm setting a cryo plant up to do work at very reasonable rates.
Because I'm pushed for room I aim on renting this place which is ideal for the job, just need a bit of a clear up first.

http://www.pallaskenry.com/images/images06/cow%20shed.jpg

.

lazlo

03-24-2010, 11:02 AM

I would like to know how many of the "cryo treating" outfits do nothing more than hold the items for a week and then ship it back.

Evan's got a really good point. Since the metal is not fundamentally changed, there's no way you can know if the piece you've sent off for cryogenic treatment was really treated.

It would make for an interesting blind study, but I bet there's at least one cryo treatment shop out there that doesn't bother with the cryo treatment :)

lazlo

03-24-2010, 11:08 AM

the process contributes to the base line on the dyno. There are other areas where I have found 35-45 additional HP over the competition. But the same engine, same parts, same clearances, same dyno, same timing, only difference being cryo, will yield a consistent measurable difference, when you are trying to squeeze every last horse out of it.

From all the papers I've read, including several that I and others have posted on this thread, the process of cryogenic quench converts residual austenite to martensite, in workpieces with incomplete heat treatment.

The end result, depending on how much residual austenite there was to begin with, is improved wear resistance.

How would improved wear resistance equate to higher horsepower output on a dyno?

Evan

03-24-2010, 11:59 AM

Also, how would you know that your part has any "retained austenite" to convert? The amount of austenite formed depends entirely on the rate of cooling of the steel, not the endpoint temperature.

David Powell

03-24-2010, 12:12 PM

I am sure that anything I have ever left out overnight in the winter in my shed has been cooled enough to do something major to it. If I pick it up my fingers tell me that it is VERY cold and my mistakes seem to have disappeared .By the time it and my fingers have warmed and my brain has turned back on,whatever happened to it has reversed itself, and all my mistakes are still evident.I will not pay anyone to do what happens naturally. An agent for cryo treatment tried to get me to set up as a sub agent, but never could come up with any real evidence that it was any more than a hoax. Regards David Powell.

bborr01

03-24-2010, 12:23 PM

Hi,

I have not read all the posts on this topic as I have had limited net access as of late but wish to share a little on the subject.

The factory that I spent my career in had a large metallurgical department, complete with electron microscope, spectrograph and a bunch of chemists and metalurgists.

We also had a very large heat treat department. I was told it was the largest heat treat facility in the US at the time.

We had a freezer in the heat treat department that was kept at -120 degrees F.

When I made many of my precision tools such as angle plates, I was told to put them in the freezer for a week or two. Seems like I may have even taken them out and put them back in a couple times.

The conventional wisdom was that it stabilized the structure of the metal and if I recall correctly, changed the austenite to martensite.

I never questioned the process. With all the educated lab people giving me direction, who was I to ask a lot of questions.

I can say that many years later I checked my angle plates with a cylinder square and they seemed to have held their accuracy quite well.

But then again they may have anyway.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Brian

Evan

03-24-2010, 01:07 PM

I was in buying some steel yesterday and I asked the owner of the shop and fabrication business if he had heard of cryo treatment. Huh? "What's that?" said Rick. This seems to be a uniquely American scam.

bborr01

03-24-2010, 04:02 PM

I was in buying some steel yesterday and I asked the owner of the shop and fabrication business if he had heard of cryo treatment. Huh? "What's that?" said Rick. This seems to be a uniquely American scam.

So this guy walks into a steel fabrication business and says to the owner, "I'd like some steel trusses built for a building I will be erecting". Can you cryogenically treat them for me so the roof stays flat?

Not a likely scenario.

I wouldn't really expect a fabricator to know much about such a thing.

Just because we don't know about/understand something does not mean it is a scam.

Brian

MrSleepy

03-24-2010, 04:39 PM

There must be something to it..some advantage.

No engineer would specify it unless there were empirical benefits.

Pretty much all engineers I've met are "cup half empty" cynics..not the types to fall for the type of crap endemic in high end audio circles.

Rob

Doc Nickel

03-24-2010, 04:50 PM

The conventional wisdom was that it stabilized the structure of the metal and if I recall correctly, changed the austenite to martensite.

I never questioned the process. With all the educated lab people giving me direction, who was I to ask a lot of questions.

I can say that many years later I checked my angle plates with a cylinder square and they seemed to have held their accuracy quite well.

-Um, yes. I believe that's the one point we can agree on; that the process can be used to help stabilize castings, and that there may be some small additional hardening or tempering effects, in ferrous alloys that were already sensitive to heat treatment.

Precision-tool castings in particular need to be "seasoned" before you bother doing the precision finishing, lest the residual stresses warp the part beyond the limits of the necessary accuracy.

However, what we have is Warbird stating that the treatment makes the iron four hundred percent more wear-resistant on a brake rotor. That borders on transmuting the metal into a different material entirely.

We have people claiming that cryo-treatment helps brass, despite brass, of course, having no austentite, martinsite, pearlite or graphite at all. Brass is an alloy of copper and tin- heat treating copper does very little, apart from annealing it after it's work-hardened a bit. And tin reacts very poorly to low temperatures- look up "tin pest".

Then there's those that are claiming that the cryo treatment improves a power outlet- with brass terminals- to make their stereo sound better.

Yes, who were you indeed, to "ask questions".

Doc.

Evan

03-24-2010, 06:14 PM

So this guy walks into a steel fabrication business and says to the owner, "I'd like some steel trusses built for a building I will be erecting". Can you cryogenically treat them for me so the roof stays flat?

Not a likely scenario.

I wouldn't really expect a fabricator to know much about such a thing.

Just because we don't know about/understand something does not mean it is a scam.

They don't build buildings. You are making rather a lot of assumptions to arrive at that statement. They do build a lot of materials handling equipment and are big users of TI plate and Abrasion resistant alloys.

Just because we don't know about/understand something does not mean it is a scam.

Too general. The correct statement is "Just because we don't know about/understand something about the temperature dependent properties of steel does not mean it is a scam."

Now that statement is applicable and demonstrably false. We DO know what happens to steel when it is cooled to -300 degrees.

Evan

03-24-2010, 06:21 PM

There must be something to it..some advantage.

No engineer would specify it unless there were empirical benefits.

You are making the unwarranted assumption that all engineers are competent.

lazlo

03-24-2010, 10:00 PM

Also, how would you know that your part has any "retained austenite" to convert?

In the papers I've read, they use microscopy to visually measure the grain size and percent of retaining austenite.

The Crucible Steel Company's ASM Paper describes using a SEM to measure the Austenite: "Cryogenic Treatment: A Mystery or Misery of Heat Treatment (http://books.google.com/books?id=cYzNYwMtQHcC&pg=PA237&lpg=PA237&dq=November+1999+Heat+Treat+Society+Conference+cry ogenic&source=web&ots=6z0U7lV7s4&sig=NwOmV35akHBiwhE0o3d6g2u9Im0&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#v=onepage&q=&f=false)"

gmatov

03-25-2010, 12:43 AM

Doc,

I think brass is an alloy of Copper and Zinc. BRONZE is an alloy of Copper and Tin.Other than that, I don't believe in the "cryogenics", either.

Cheers,

George

Evan

03-25-2010, 12:58 AM

In the papers I've read, they use microscopy to visually measure the grain size and percent of retaining austenite.

I meant the average customer of the "service".

George,

Some bronzes are brasses and some brasses are bronze. Some have tin, some have zinc and some have aluminum and some have all three. There isn't a hard and fast rule about what constitutes bronze or brass. As a group they are called "Yellow metals".

gmatov

03-25-2010, 01:18 AM

Evan,

I will, of course, defer to your interpretation. Historically, and metalurgically, I believe that Tin made Bronze and Zinc made brass.

I think you can make any alloy you want and call it this or that.

It does not mean it is this or that.

Admiralty Bronze, cannon barrels, would burst were they made of Zinc. They would not if they were alloyed with Tin.

Brass fittings would leach the Zinc when used with steam. Brionze fittings would not. Bronze bushings will last, Brass bushings will not. Adding extraneous materials does not make brass into Bronze, unless you simply add more of this or that to the alloy. And then, you have a completely different alloy..

I was in buying some steel yesterday and I asked the owner of the shop and fabrication business if he had heard of cryo treatment. Huh? "What's that?" said Rick. This seems to be a uniquely American scam.

Bullsh*t. I suggest you contact Dr. Ronald Kosher. I've chewed the fat with him on several occasions regarding cutting tools. He's specializes in:

I'm not saying there isn't a lot of B.S. floating around out there regarding cryo treating ... it's a bit like the "billet aluminum" thing. But you can't say that it is a "uniquely American scam" just because you talked to the owner of one fab/machine shop. That is just ridiculous.

p.s. you all caught me in a bad mood. sorry for the crass reply.

Evan

03-25-2010, 03:51 AM

I will ask another shop owner in the morning since I am going into town again and plan on visiting the first guy to set up a CNC shop here.

The owners of the shop where I asked aren't exactly new to this sport. The shop has been in operation for a long time, over 50 years. If the cryo treat scam was at all alive and well here they would have heard about it.

But you can't say that it is a "uniquely American scam" just because you talked to the owner of one fab/machine shop. That is just ridiculous.

Why not? The origin of the word Scam is from the US carnival industry. There is a reason for that including the famous quote from P.T. Barnum, "There is a sucker born every minute". Scamming has a long tradition in the US, not so much in Canada. Many such activities originate within the US.

Doc Nickel

03-25-2010, 04:54 AM

Scamming has a long tradition in the US, not so much in Canada. Many such activities originate within the US.

But seriously, scamming well predates either the United States or Canada. While Wikipedia suggests the "spanish prisoner" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Prisoner) con dates to the 'early 1900s', (based on a Snopes "first recorded mention" type reference) it supposedly dates much further back than that, possibly as far as the 14th century.

Scamming is a human trait that knows no boundary.

Doc.

JCHannum

03-25-2010, 11:15 AM

There is a reason for that including the famous quote from P.T. Barnum, "There is a sucker born every minute".

While the quote is commonly attributed to Barnum, he did not make it. It was made by David Hannum referring to Barnum's exhibiting a copy of the Cardiff Giant and trying to pass it off as the original.

lazlo

03-25-2010, 11:32 AM

While Wikipedia suggests the "spanish prisoner" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Prisoner) con dates to the 'early 1900s', (based on a Snopes "first recorded mention" type reference) it supposedly dates much further back than that, possibly as far as the 14th century.

Holy Cow, I had never heard of the "Spanish Prisoner" con. You mean the Nigerians didn't invent the bank wire scam?! :D

TGTool

03-25-2010, 11:33 AM

While the quote is commonly attributed to Barnum, he did not make it. It was made by David Hannum referring to Barnum's exhibiting a copy of the Cardiff Giant and trying to pass it off as the original.

Jim,

Any relation? Does that mean that you come from a long line of de-bunkers?

Evan

03-25-2010, 12:11 PM

While the quote is commonly attributed to Barnum, he did not make it. It was made by David Hannum referring to Barnum's exhibiting a copy of the Cardiff Giant and trying to pass it off as the original.

Who would ever fall for that? :D

http://metalshopborealis.ca/pics/bones.jpg

JCHannum

03-25-2010, 12:33 PM

Jim,

Any relation? Does that mean that you come from a long line of de-bunkers?

I don't know a lot about the Hannum family in the US. There was apparently a tie to carnivals and circuses that were common in the latter part of the 19th & early 20th centuries.

David Hannum was not a debunker, he was one of the backers of the "true" Cardiff Giant.

Who would ever fall for that? :D

http://metalshopborealis.ca/pics/bones.jpg

Gullibility is a human condition. You need to look no farther than the global warming and swine flu crises as examples of how easily the public can be duped. It seems the carnies have been replaced by the pols.

lazlo

03-25-2010, 01:26 PM

While the quote is commonly attributed to Barnum, he did not make it. It was made by David Hannum referring to Barnum's exhibiting a copy of the Cardiff Giant and trying to pass it off as the original.

That part of the story was hilarious, and very American: Barnum wanted to lease the fake giant corpse, but he and Hannum couldn't agree to terms, so Barnum hired a sculptor to make a copy in plaster, and Barnum started showing it as "the real Cardiff Giant", saying that Hannum's was a fake.

So who resides on a lower level of Hell -- the con artist, or the plagiarist? ;)

You need to look no farther than the global warming and swine flu crises as examples of how easily the public can be duped.

Making not so subtle jabs about the swine flu pandemic can get you in trouble.

Current estimation is that it hasn't even peaked yet. It has however filled emergency rooms around the world with young people and many of them died.

vpt

03-25-2010, 02:53 PM

Someone here should test this cryo treating. There has to be a way. Maybe some HSS bits for the lathe or something? Use the HSS to turn some hard metal that will eat up the HSS over a short time, send the HSS in for treatment and try it again on the same piece of metal.

lazlo

03-25-2010, 03:03 PM

Someone here should test this cryo treating. There has to be a way. Maybe some HSS bits for the lathe or something?

I've been thinking of doing exactly that. I mentioned Bryson's Heat Treating (http://www.amazon.com/Heat-Treatment-Selection-Application-Steels/dp/1569902380) book earlier in the thread, which has a chapter describing how to do cryo treatment in the home shop.

A simple method he describes is continuing the quench to a dry ice/alcohol mixture. The full-blown cryogenic treatment he describes involves erecting a riser in a Styrofoam cooler, putting the steel for treatment on the riser, and pouring small quantities of liquid nitrogen around the riser. The idea is to slow the drop in temperature as much as possible and to keep the workpiece dry. Straight immersion in liquid nitrogen will either shatter it, or create stress inclusions from thermal shock.

He warns that doing a proper cryogenic treatment is time consuming, since you have to periodically dribble more liquid nitrogen around the riser to keep the level up, but not wet the workpiece.

The reason I haven't tried it (besides not owning a dewar -- the local welding gas suppliers won't sell you liquid nitrogen without a dewar) is because I don't see a straightforward way to measure the wear resistance. Some of the papers I've read over the last week do a pin-on-disk method, where you press a cryogenically treated pin onto a spinning disk, and measure the weight before and after. The amount of wear is very small, so you have to have an extremely accurate scale, and be super anal with your measurement techniques.

Fasttrack

03-25-2010, 04:17 PM

Why not? The origin of the word Scam is from the US carnival industry. There is a reason for that including the famous quote from P.T. Barnum, "There is a sucker born every minute". Scamming has a long tradition in the US, not so much in Canada. Many such activities originate within the US.

Because one person is not a statistically significant sample size. It doesn't matter who you ask or where you ask it. I know three seperate machinists in this town who had never heard of cryo treating, despite the fact that the university is doing research with it right next door. What does that mean? How do I interpert that?

I expect that your statement that most scams originate in the US is true, but that has no bearing on what I said. The fact that one person in Canada doesn't know about cryo treating doesn't suggest that it is a uniquely American scam. All it tells us is that he hasn't heard of it - period. Your argument that it is a uniquely American scam is entirely dependent upon your assumption that it is a scam. Congratulations of failing to use logic appropriately.

Yes ... I'm still in a bad mood. Too much work. Need a break. :(

Instead of talking to random shop owners in Canada, why don't you consult an academic who specializes in this research. They are much less biased than the companies which offer cryo treating and they are (generally) much more educated in the field than Joe down the street who owns a shop. All Joe has to go on is what he has heard - he doesn't conduct any tests. His info comes from out-dated sources and/or those cryo treating companies.

Evan

03-25-2010, 05:58 PM

Your argument that it is a uniquely American scam is entirely dependent upon your assumption that it is a scam

It isn't an assumption.

As for sample sizes, statistical significance is entirely dependent on the size of the population being sampled as well as the likelyhood that the population would know the information in question.

There are many examples when a sample size of 1 is a valid sample. In this case a single query is sufficient to establish that the biggest machine shop in WIlliams lake has never used cryo treating. That, by extension means that none of their customers have ever asked for it to be done. In effect that grows the sample size to at least hundreds.

topct

03-25-2010, 06:13 PM

The cryogenic treatment of metals, and the resultant effect, is not a scam.

There seems to a lot of businesses that are committing interstate fraud if it is, and I haven't heard of any charges being filed.

Just Google the subject. Judging by the results I have found, it would have be a multi-billion dollar scam.

Anyone that thinks it is, is ignorant of the facts.

I do have a problem with the horsepower increases claimed however. That is not a product of the process. Reliability is the goal.

JCHannum

03-25-2010, 06:34 PM

Making not so subtle jabs about the swine flu pandemic can get you in trouble.

How and with who?

As for sample sizes, statistical significance is entirely dependent on the size of the population being sampled as well as the likelyhood that the population would know the information in question.

There are many examples when a sample size of 1 is a valid sample. In this case a single query is sufficient to establish that the biggest machine shop in WIlliams lake has never used cryo treating. That, by extension means that none of their customers have ever asked for it to be done. In effect that grows the sample size to at least hundreds.

That is hardly a valid argument since you have no idea of how many people in Williams Lake have heard of cryo, how many have any desire to have it done or how many are currently having it done elsewhere, realizing that it is probably not available in a small Canadian town. All it proves is that no one has asked that particular person about cryo.

Hopefully, we are more intelligent today than we were a hundred or a thousand years ago, and we are definitely not as intelligent as those who survive will be in the next one hundred or thousand years. We don't know all that is in our oceans, and we certainly don't know all there is to be known about thermal processing of materials.

Evan

03-25-2010, 11:01 PM

The cryogenic treatment of metals, and the resultant effect, is not a scam.

There seems to a lot of businesses that are committing interstate fraud if it is, and I haven't heard of any charges being filed.

Just Google the subject. Judging by the results I have found, it would have be a multi-billion dollar scam.

Anyone that thinks it is, is ignorant of the facts.

There is a principle in science that isn't well known or appreciated. A theory is not just an explanation of how something works. It is an intitial hypothesis that has been confirmed experimentally using existing principles as the starting point for the explanation of a new mechanism, for example. The value of a theory is shown in the fact that it is able to predict further previously unknown aspects of the mechanism it explains.

It is the predictive power of a theory that makes it valid as an explanation of observations of the physical world.

So far there is no consistent theory that even explains any effects that might be attributed to cryogenic treatment of metals. The claimed increases in wear life are not accompanied by any measurable changes in the surface hardness or other relevant properties of the material. Any theory that explains cryo processing must also explain why the results are invisible to modern macroscopic testing methods.

There in nothing that even remotely resembles a working hypothesis let alone a theory. Yet, we have solid theories that predict the behaviours of metals at reduced temperatures all the way to nearly absolute zero.

The little known principle I referred to above is that no theory is ever proven. It is supported by evidence only. All it takes to invalidate a theory is a single null result that the theory predicted to be non-null.

In other words if the cryogenic treatment process fails to produce the expected result even once then all explanations of the efficacy and possible mechanism are wrong. We are then left with the usual statement that so often accompany a scam. "You didn't do it right"

Warning signs that something is probably a scam:

If it sounds too good to be true then is probabably is.

Nobody knows how it works yet.

It works by scientific principles not recognized by the establishment

You will know it works when you try it.

It is expensive.

There is a reference to some sort of attempt to suppress the information/process/invention

Government doesn't like it for some reason and will not use it.

No test is available that can quantify the results.

No double blind trials exist that show a positive result.

References to testing always involve parties with a vested interest in the product.

ADGO_Racing

03-26-2010, 12:56 AM

Let me set something straight. I DID NOT say that the 35-45 HP gain was from this process. I said I have a bunch of other tricks up my sleeve that give me the additional HP. I stated that using the same setup and same parts yields a measurable difference between identical motors. One Cryoed and one not Cryoed. It happens that I do not build every motor the same. Cryo is only done if the customer wants to pay for it. If they don't it generally gets the same parts and craftsmanship as a Cryoed motor, there are some exceptions to that too.

Between the same motor being Cryoed or not being Cryoed, there is a measurable difference. It is small, but big enough that it isn't just small differences in parts, or me having a good day. We build the same setup routinely, I can dyno ten motors built identical, to one of my standard setup sheets, they will all be with 7-12 HP of one another. I can completely tear one apart and re assemble it and it will be +/- 2 HP on the dyno. That difference is within the realm of having a good/bad day, or minor mechanical advantages/errors. I have good base lines that we work from.

Also as stated before, I don't think the 400% increase in brake rotor life is due to "wear" alone. It is also due to the lack of warping. I am sure the specification calls out the criteria. I have not read the spec, as it is not critical to what we do here. I think that someone claiming that they "wear" that much less is trying to hype something or sell something to people who do not understand. That being said to the average housewife driver, who doesn't even know what brakes are, rotors which last longer doe to a lack of warping would not "wear out" as often. Brake rotors subject to constant cycling do warp, especially if the lug nuts are not torqued evenly (As most auto mechanics think they need to tighten them until they squeak with an impact wrench. A good subject for another thread.). We too are guilty of that at the track, but hey, it isn't like we have all the time in the world to put a torque wrench on 20 nuts. Plus most of our stuff has a rather limited life expectancy.

I just priced a set of four new rotors for a guy today. He is having them Cryoed. The additional money is worth it to him, as he ran the set that I am facing for him now, for the entire season last year. They are not warped, just the usual wear marks. One is torn up kind of bad, don't know if it is salvageable, they wore the brake pads off in the last race, steel backing plate on rotor gets ugly fast. He was never able to run an entire season on one set of rotors before. He plans to keep the old ones for spares. I have had rotors through here from the same track that could not be faced, because they were warped so bad, they would never clean up within spec.

vpt

03-26-2010, 01:02 AM

What I heard about it is that it will reduce wear like on cylinder walls and even rings and main bearings and will strengthen rods, cranks, pistons, etc.

gmatov

03-26-2010, 02:29 AM

Evan,

All you link to doesn't change that traditionally,and metalurgically, bronze is primarily composed of tin and copper, and brass is composed of zinc and copper.

Deferring, again, I don't care how many alloys they make today, and how many ingredients they use, and all for the improvement of the product, or for the temporary protection of a patent.

Bronze is traditionally Copper and Tin, Brass is traditionally Copper and Zinc. You may add Iron, Phosphorous, Aluminum, Tungsten, even.

It will either be sold as Bronze or Brass. I am not saying that you cannot ad other metals to the alloy, but if you do, it is still an alloy of Bronze or an alloy of Brass.

Is Hastalloy actually a HSS, if it is less than 50% Iron, or steel, or is it an entirely new material? Some is 60% Cobalt. How can you call that HSS? I know it is no longer called Hasting's alloy. Forget for the moment who owns it. Demar, something like that?

Oh, yeah, it is still called Stellite.

Cheers,

George

Glenn Wegman

04-15-2010, 10:54 AM

Just ran accross this from Crucible Steel while looking up some specs.

Apparently, they are somewhat familiar with Cryogenics...and Metallurgy.

Glenn, I don't blame you for not reading through all 16 pages of the thread, but on page two I posted a report from Crucible Steel Company published in the Journal of the ASM, entitled: Cryogenic Treatment: A Mystery or Misery of Heat Treatment.

http://bbs.homeshopmachinist.net/showpost.php?p=531883&postcount=22

The best objective analysis I've seen on this is the Crucible Steel Company's 2000 ASM Paper entitled "Cryogenic Treatment: A Mystery or Misery of Heat Treatment (http://books.google.com/books?id=cYzNYwMtQHcC&pg=PA237&lpg=PA237&dq=November+1999+Heat+Treat+Society+Conference+cry ogenic&source=web&ots=6z0U7lV7s4&sig=NwOmV35akHBiwhE0o3d6g2u9Im0&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#v=onepage&q=&f=false)"

Crucible (the guys who make CPM tool steel) tested a variety of tool steels in different combination of heat treatment and cryogenic freezing, and found absolutely no improvement in hardness, bend fracture strength, toughness, or wear resistance of A2, D2, M2, or CPM Rex 76.

ckelloug

04-15-2010, 12:15 PM

I read the report lazlo posted and it had a reference to the following report from the department of energy which is available on line:

The conclusion tracks well with the other papers I've read (and posted here): cryogenic quench shows negligible improvement on property heat-treated steel, but does show some improvement on improperly heat-treated steels by converted residual austenite :

The purpose of the investigation was to determine if cryogenic treatment improved the life and cost effectiveness of perishable cutting tools over other treatments or coatings. Test results showed that in five of seven of the perishable cutting tools tested there was no improvement in tool life. The other two tools showed a small gain in tool life, but not as much as when switching manufacturers of the cutting tool. The following conclusions were drawn from this study:

(1) titanium nitride coatings are more effective than cryogenic treatment in increasing the life of perishable cutting tools made from all cutting tool materials

(2) cryogenic treatment may increase tool life if the cutting tool is improperly heat treated during its origination, and

(3) cryogenic treatment was only effective on those tools made from less sophisticated high speed tool steels.